Having a fast Mac can help you become more productive either with your daily job or creative work. Also, a fast Mac can be an excellent tool for after-work entertainment. You will feel like being much more comfortable than you used to be, the tasks will complete much faster, and your overall productivity will skyrocket. Unfortunately, if you have no idea how to take care of and speed up your Mac, the computer will become slower and slower over time, especially if you have a habit of accumulating unneeded files on it.
To help you speed up your Mac, today, we will share eight steps that will help boost your computer’s performance and efficiency.
Step #1: Trim the List of Startup Items
All of the apps that launch automatically after your Mac turns on are called startup items. It is very likely that only a small part of those items are set to be login items manually. Often, when you install a new app and agree to its terms and services, it has an option to become a startup item.
Therefore, we recommend you check the list of your startup items and trim it down to have a faster startup process when you turn on your computer. You will find the list of startup items by going to System Preferences, choosing Users & Groups, clicking on your nickname, and going to the Login items.
Step #2: Remove Apps You Do Not Use
The less free space you have on your Mac, the slower it will perform. To understand if you have a problem with system storage, check the free disk space data by clicking the Apple icon on the top menu, going to About This Mac, and choosing Storage.
If you see that apps are using a lot of space on your computer, take time to have a look at what you have installed and uninstall the unneeded apps.
Step #3. Turn off some Visual Effects
Turning off visual effects is a beneficial trick to use when trying to figure out how to make your Mac run faster. Who cares if they look delightful if your Mac is running slowly? Your MacBook may be significantly sped up by turning off several of the functions.
- Boot up your Mac.
- Go to System Settings > Desktop & Dock.
- From the list, disable these options: Magnification, Automatically hide and show the Dock, and Animate opening applications.
- Lastly, go to the Minimize Windows Using option, and change the default Genie effect to the Scale effect, these changes should help you out considerably.
Step #4: Review Your Downloads Folder
If you are looking for large files to delete and free up more disk space for a better speed, you should look at your Downloads folder.
The folder may include some large installations such as games and PDF files that haven’t been used for ages and hardly ever will. Thus, once in a while, take a look at this folder and clean it up.
Step #5: Choose a Cloud Storage
If you are a creative person and work in niches like graphic design or video editing, you likely have many large media files. Thus, a problem of insufficient storage space should be a common problem for you.
As you cannot exchange all of your work for a better computer speed, it is a smart idea to choose a cloud storage service like iCloud, Google Drive, or DropBox. If you need more storage space, you can always upgrade to a better plan; plus, cloud storage will let you access your files from almost any device if you have a network connection.
Step #6. Reindex Spotlight on Mac
You are likely aware of the sluggishness that occurs when Spotlight is indexing if you just updated your OS. Your Mac will be back to normal after a short while when it’s completed. However, there are situations when indexing gets frozen, and you need to restart it. To fix this issue, open System Settings > Siri & Spotlight and choose Spotlight Privacy from the list of options at the bottom of the window. Drag your hard disk into the Privacy List from Finder. Click the “-” button to delete it after it has been added to the list. The indexing will restart, but ideally, it will complete successfully and speed up your Mac after a few hours.
Step #7: Use an External Storage Device
For those of you who need a lot of extra storage for your files but are unable to ensure a stable network connection because of reasons like constant traveling, an external storage device might be a better solution than cloud storage.
The file-sharing won’t be as easy as with cloud storage, but there are other benefits. First of all, you won’t have to worry about not being able to access your files because of a bad internet connection, and you can listen to downloaded Spotify playlists on a plane. Read our HDD and SSD comparison to choose between them.
Step #8: Delete Mail Attachments
If you are using the macOS Mail app, you need to know that every time you receive or send an email with an attachment, a copy of that attachment is stored on your Mac and taking up disk space.
Luckily, if you delete Mail attachments from your computer, you will still be able to find them on your Mail app. To delete the attachments, go to Users, choose your name, click on Library, go to Containers, then go to com.apple.mail, choose Data, then Library, and select Mail Downloads.
Step #9. Update your Mac’s Hardware and Software
We all know that Macs often look after themselves. The newest Apple software makes it simple to speed up your Mac. Click the Apple symbol in the upper left corner of your screen, followed by About This Mac, to see your operating system version. Install the most recent version of macOS (or the latest you can install).
The hardware upgrade is usually expensive, as you would have expected. But if your OS is the most recent version available, your hard drive has been wiped, and you still experience performance issues, this might be the answer. Keep in mind though that some Macs do not support hardware upgrades.
Step #10: Remove Browser Extensions
Popular browsers like Safari, Google Chrome, And Firefox have many browser extensions to offer. If you are using them, they can make you more productive and help you do your work faster. For example, if you are a freelance writer, using Grammarly extension will save you a lot of time editing the text you wrote.
On the other hand, if you have too many extensions, it will slow down the way your website browser performs and, as a result, will make your Mac slower, so don’t overdo it.
Step #11: Sync Mac With Other Accessories & Devices
One of Apple devices’ most significant advantages is that they sync together very well and make your life so much easier.
For example, if you have a Mac and an Apple Watch, make sure you connect those two and enable the option to unlock your computer every time you are wearing the watch and come close to the computer. This way, you will not have to use your fingerprint or enter the computer password.
Step #12. Check Malware and viruses
The majority of known malware and viruses are successfully blocked by your Mac, but new dangers arise every day. There might be a few viruses on your Mac that might be making it laggy. Malware always has unwelcome consequences, which can vary from intrusive pop-up advertisements to your files being held for ransom.
Mac users may still be exposed to a variety of online risks, including spam and phishing emails, browser flaws, and identity theft, even though macOS contains features to limit the spread of malware if it does occur. Get any trusted antivirus software to get the job done.
Step #13. Factory Reset – The Final Way
The final resort is to reboot your entire Mac and do a fresh reinstallation of the OS if everything else fails. Considering that you’ll need to fully remove your boot drive, this should only be a final resort. All the files that have accumulated over time in your System and User Libraries will be deleted.
After your OS has been installed, we advise backing up all of your important data, papers, photos, music, and other items you might require. In the end, it could be time to get a new one if the worst happens and your Mac doesn’t get any better.