

My personal favorite is #2 for a benign restart, but I probably haven't discovered all the unique ways. If you run into a problem, one of these techniques should work for you. OS X will relaunch the Finder automatically. Enter the command: killall -KILL FinderĬ. The SSH daemon will probably be running even if the Finder is locked up.)ī. (If you can't do that from the Finder, try an SSH from another computer.
#Relaunchfinder mac
The Terminal app on the Mac (or remotely)Ī. If that's not possible, log out then log in. To relaunch, click the Finder icon on the left side of the Dock.

In this technique, the Finder really is stopped for good and is not relaunched. The reason for that is that Force Quit is a brutal way to stop an app, and we always want to stop an app with the least force required in order to avoid potential damage to the system.į. If that doesn't work, try again with Force Quit. Click the "x" icon on the top left under the colored buttons.Į. Optional: Click the Process name header to alphabetize the process names. If you can, launch the Activity Monitor app from /Applications/Utilities.ī. Right-click the Finder icon in the Dock while holding down the OPTION key.Ī. Note, you can always open this window directly with CMD+OPTION+ESC.Ī. It says "Relaunch" instead of "Force Quit" - which is probably what you want. (Apps that aren't responding will be shown in red.) Note that the button in Force Quit is different for the Finder app. Ive tried fixing permissions, fixing hardlinks, unlinked/relinked twice. Select Relaunch and use your Finder again to see if the problem persists.
#Relaunchfinder how to
Hold down the SHIFT key and open the Apple menu.Īlternatively, you can simply select Force Quit and relaunch the Finder from the list of running apps. issue (on a Mac) It stays like this forever. How to Force Relaunch Finder: Select the Apple icon, top left on your MacBook. Make sure the Finder is the frontmost app.ī. For example, " Frozen: How to Force the Restart of a Mac."Ī. Press Enter to force quit the application. Use the arrow keys to navigate and select the app causing the trouble. Here’s how to do it: Press Command + Option + Esc to open the Force Quit Window. Worst case, of course, is a restart of your Mac. You can also relaunch Finder using the force quit window to refresh your graphical user interface. If the Finder is really hosed, you may not be able to launch apps as in technique #3 below and you may have to resort to Unix trickery as in technique #4. These techniques generally assume you are doing a configuration change that requires a benign relaunch (kill and restart) of the OS X Finder. Here are four different ways to handle the Finder with a view to a kill. Using Force Quit Solution to Fix Finder How Do You Reset Finder on a Mac From Activity Monitor Relaunch Finder By Deleting the Preference Files Via Terminal. Make sure it works like the original and all your data is accessible. After the process completes, set the external drive as the startup disk, in System Preferences Startup pane, and try to start up from it. Or perhaps you've made a configuration change that requires a Finder restart. Use a cloning utility (Carbon Copy Cloner or SuperDuper) to duplicate your internal drive to the external drive.

(It is, after all, just an app.) Perhaps it's locked up. Good news is that rebooting the finder process doesn’t re-open the get info planes, but does open all of your current folders again.There are times when it's necessary to restart the Mac's Finder.
#Relaunchfinder windows
If your like me and rarely turn off your computer (any further than a ‘sleep’) then your OSX finder can get a bit buggy, so it’s always good to have an idea on how to restart the process.Īlso there might be some other times that you want to do this for example I just accidently did “Get Info” on 120 video files that I have thinking that would give me the total size, it doesn’t! Instead you just get 120 windows with the information for each video (see screenshot at bottom of the post), and the Mac goes crazy because it tries to generate a preview on each one… its very annoying not knowing whats not he drive whats not or what happened.
