How To Fix Frozen Screen On Mac

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The pizza wheel. The beach ball. The spinning pinwheel of death. Whatever you prefer to call it, the rainbow-colored ball that pops up on your Mac's screen and refuses to go away is a bad omen signaling that your computer has frozen. Apple provides a number of ways to thaw frozen Macs.

1
Force-quit a frozen program. If a program is frozen, but your computer is still responsive, you can force-quit the program and continue using the computer. There are several ways you can force-quit a frozen program:
- Click your desktop or any other open window to switch focus away from the frozen app. Click the Apple menu and select "Force Quit". Highlight the frozen program and click "Force Quit" to close it.
- Press ⌘ Command+ ⌥ Option+Esc to open the Force Quit menu. Select the frozen program and click "Force Quit".
- Hold the ⌥ Option key and Ctrl -click the app's icon in the Dock. Select "Force Quit" from the menu.
2
Reboot your frozen Mac computer. If your system is not responding, or you can't open any of the Force Quit menus, you can force the computer to reboot.^[1] There are several ways you can do this, even if you can't move the mouse.^[2]
- Press ⌘ Command+Ctrl+ ⏏ Eject to force the computer to reboot. The ⏏ Eject key can be found in the upper-right corner of the keyboard. Newer MacBooks may not have an ⏏ Eject key.
- If the keyboard command doesn't work, or you don't have an ⏏ Eject key, press and hold the Power button for about five seconds to force the computer to turn off.^[3] The Power button is located in the upper-right corner of MacBook keyboards, or on the back side of iMacs and other desktops.

1

Determine if the problem is with a program or your system. If the freezing only occurs when running a specific program, it is likely the program that is causing the problem. If the freezing occurs randomly, or when performing everyday tasks on the computer, there is likely a problem with the operating system. If the computer is freezing when trying to use a peripheral, such as a printer or a USB drive, that device may be causing the problem. Getting a general idea of the source will help your troubleshooting efforts.
2
Check your free space. If your boot drive is running out of free space, it could be causing system instability. Your boot drive (the drive containing your operating system files) should generally have at least 10 GB of free space. If you have less than this, you may start encountering errors.^[4]
- The quickest way to check your available space is to click the Apple menu and select "About This Mac". Click the "Storage" tab to view your used and available space. If you have less than 10 GB of free space available, delete some files or programs that you don't need anymore.
3
Update your apps and operating system. The freezing you're experiencing may be a known bug that was fixed with a more recent version of the program or the OS X operating system. Updating your software may fix the problem you're having.
- Click the Apple menu and select "Software Update". Download and install any available updates. This tool will find and install updates for your operating system and any apps installed through the Mac App Store.
- Update non-App Store apps individually. If you've installed programs from outside of the app store, you'll need to run each program's Update tool or install the latest version from the website.
4
Disconnect all of your peripherals. Sometimes a problem with a device may cause your computer to freeze. Unplug all of your peripheral devices, including printers, scanners, and external hard drives or thumb drives.
- Plug the devices back in one at a time and test each one to see if the freezing happens. This can help you determine which device is causing problems.
- If you've found a specific device is causing your computer to freeze, check online to see if others have had the same problem with the device, and if the manufacturer has released any fixes.
5
Perform a Safe Boot. If none of the above steps have helped fix your freezing issue, a Safe Boot may do the trick. This will only load the essential files that OS X needs to run, and will automatically perform a variety of troubleshooting scripts.^[5]
- To start a Safe Boot, restart your Mac and hold the ⇧ Shift key as soon as you hear the startup sound. This will load the Safe Boot mode. If your Mac reboots automatically while in Safe Boot, it is likely working a fixing a problem with the boot drive.
- If the computer isn't freezing in Safe Boot mode, reboot your computer as normal to see if the problem was fixed during the Safe Boot.
6
Repair your boot disk in Recovery Mode. If there's a problem with your boot disk, you may be able to repair it using the Disk Utility in Recovery Mode.^[6]
- Reboot your computer and hold ⌘ Command+R during startup.
- Select "Recovery HD" from the menu that appears.
- Choose the "Disk Utility" option.
- Select the drive that you want to check for errors and then click the "Repair" or "First Aid" tab.
- Click "Repair Disk" to begin scanning for problems. If problems are found, Disk Utility will attempt to automatically fix them. This may take a while to complete.

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Question

What if my Mac still isn't working after I force reboot it?

Chiara Corsaro is the General Manager and Apple Certified Mac & iOS Technician for macVolks, Inc., an Apple Authorized Service Provider located in the San Francisco Bay Area. macVolks, Inc. was founded in 1990, is accredited by the Better Business Bureau (BBB) with an A+ rating, and is part of the Apple Consultants Network (ACN).

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If at that point you're still experiencing freezing issues, I would say as a precaution, especially if you do not have a backup, to turn your computer off completely. Because when you do experience slow performance issues sometimes—not to say every time—but sometimes that can be an indication of a hardware failure, specifically the hard drive, or even possibly the memory.
Question

What should I do if my Mac isn't responding?

Manually restart it using the ON/OFF button.
Question

What do I do if my Mac is freezing periodically?

Back up your hard disk using Time Machine! These periodic freezes are warning that the system is deteriorating. Save everything before it does.
Question

My iMac screensaver is frozen but the arrow cursor will move. I have tried several ways to reboot but nothing works. Any advice?

Try to hold the shut down button for about 10 seconds until you hear it turn it off. Then turn it back on and wait.
Question

How do I do an update?

Check out this article on updating a Mac.
Question

What if my screen is not frozen and my mouse moves, but when I click, the Mac doesn't respond?

Hold the power button for around 5 - 10 seconds, then turn the Mac back on. It should fix the problem temporarily.