Oh, the spinning wheel. Everyone who has ever owned a Mac computer knows about this and I’m sure you have let out a few curse words or been tempted to throw your computer across the room upon the sight of it. I personally refer to this symbol not-so-fondly as the ‘spinning beachball of doom’. That is probably too dire of a description of the thing but it reflects my mood when it appears as it’s usually synonymous with some sort of problem.

If you have experience with the spinning wheel, you know that you want to get rid of it as quickly as possible. It’s a sign that things aren’t functioning quite right on your computer. This could be a small issue or a really large one, the spinning wheel doesn’t always reveal its secrets right away. This article will take a look at some things you can do to get rid of the spinning wheel on your Mac computer.

Oct 04, 2016  I ensured that the watch is disassociated with my old phone AND my new phone. I noticed on the 7+ that when I looked under Health App Sources all sources (same watch twice and my phone), when I tap on then, the wheel spins again, while on the old phone (6S) the sources all have data.

What is the Spinning Wheel?

The spinning wheel may be known by many different names but what it actually is a system indicator that is technically called a throbber. Yes, that’s right, a throbber. It sounds comical but if you have experience with one, you know that it means an issue might be lurking inside your computer. This is not a symbol unique to Mac computers, though their multi-colored wheel is well known among Apple users.

The spinning wheel indicates common issues such as when a program is performing some sort of action that is in progress, when demanding computing tasks are taking place, or when a Mac is frozen altogether. The wheel can appear when you are downloading something, trying to operate a program that is CPU intensive, or when your computer is working through an operation.

The spinning wheel is a broad indicator and you most likely won’t know the exact reason why it has popped up on your computer screen. Many times, the wheel is only up briefly while your computer figures things out on its own but sometimes the wheel can appear and cause your entire system to freeze up.

How to Get Rid of the Spinning Wheel

Unfortunately, there is no exact method of getting rid of the spinning wheel that works every time. The cause of the wheel can be a number of different things affecting your computer and therefore require a different solution to fix the problem. Try the solutions below if you experience the spinning wheel on your MacBook.

Force Quit

Oftentimes, the spinning wheel appears when a program becomes unresponsive. This can happen when a program is demanding and your computer can’t quite keep up. By force quitting the program, you can usually get rid of the spinning wheel.

To force quit:

1. Go to the Apple menu at the top-left of your screen.
2. Click Force Quit.
3. Select the unresponsive program or app from the list.
4. Click Force Quit.

You can also simply hit the Command, Option, and Escape keys at the same time to access the force quit menu and quit a non-responsive app or program.

Use Disk Utility

If you experience the spinning wheel often and you can’t seem to find an unresponsive program as the cause, you might be able to address the issue by using Disk Utility.

1. Open the Finder on your computer.
2. Select Applications.
3. Click on the Disk Utility icon.
4. Select your main hard drive.
5. Click on the Repair Permissions button.

This small disk repair might fix your repeated spinning wheel issue.

Single User Reset

Another option you can try to use to fix repeated spinning wheel issues is to enter Single User mode on your computer upon reset to attempt to fix any small file errors that might be the cause of the problem.

1. Restart your computer.
2. Hold down the Command and S keys while restarting.
3. Hold down these keys until you see the Apple logo appear on your screen.
4. Release the keys and your screen will now appear black with some lines of data and an old-style computer prompt.
5. Type fsck -y and be sure to include a space in between the k and the -y.
6. Press Enter.

Bigger Issues

If you have an older Mac computer, your spinning wheel problems may be the result of bigger issues that don’t have an easy fix. The wheel can appear due to overworked CPU or insufficient RAM. If the cause of the spinning wheel is either one of these issues, there is no easy fix and you might have to get a new computer to keep up with the demands of modern apps and programs that are overworking your system and resulting in the the wheel appearing.

To check your CPU usage:

1. Open your Finder.
2. Go to Applications.
3. Click on Utilities.
4. Click on Activity Monitor.
5. You can now see your CPU usage.

You will see a display here that will give you a graph and some data points on your CPU usage. If the number here is above 50 percent and you are not currently running any apps or programs, your processor is most likely not able to keep up with your system and it might be time for a new computer altogether.

Final Thoughts

If you happen to see the spinning wheel on your Mac, take a breath and reread this article. Usually, the wheel can be fixed by a simple force quit of a program that is unresponsive. If that doesn’t work, follow the other steps listed here to address the issue and get your computer working again. Nobody likes to see the spinning wheel but now you have the ability to address the problem and try to remedy the issue on your own.

Do you have a nickname for the spinning wheel? Does it happen on your computer often?

Known as spinning color wheel, Spinning Pinwheel, Rainbow Wheel, or Spinning Beach Ball, in reality, is just a wait cursor that Mac displays when it is busy with some internal operations.

The quick and easy way to stop the spinning color wheel is to close the unresponsive app. Click on Apple menu in the top left corner of the screen and select “Force Quit…”. In the Force Quit Applications window select the unresponsive application and click on “Force Quit” button.

This way, you will force quit (Apple’s name for terminate) the hung app. Unfortunately, this is not the best way to deal with the problem, and it’s not suggested if you want to stop a spinning wheel on Mac without losing work.

If the issue is happening too often I suggest to investigate the root cause and fix the underlying problem.

Following are eight possible solutions to get rid off spinning wheel once and for all:

Check Mac for Viruses

There is a common myth that Macs don’t get viruses, but this is not true. Macs can get viruses and malware, so having an antivirus installed is always a good idea.

If your Mac gets a virus, the latter can impact the computer performance in various ways: use too much CPU and internet and deprive other apps of resources, cause instability in running apps and freeze Mac.

And it’s not just my opinion. Last year, when I had issues with my old MacBook, I decided to call Apple support and see if they could help. The first thing the Apple tech made me do is to install and run Malwarebytes for Mac.

But even if you don’t think you got a virus, it never hurts to run a malware check just to be safe.

Upgrade Mac By Adding More Memory (RAM)

If the Mac freezes too often, then it is likely that the computer does not have enough hardware resources. The Mac experiences so-called hardware pressure.

There are three main variations of hardware pressure: CPU, Disk, and memory (RAM).

It’s easy to know if your Mac is experiencing memory pressure.
Start Activity Monitor by doing one of the following:

1. Open Finder. Go to Applications and then to Utilities folder. Find Activity Monitor and start it.
2. Start Spotlight Search by pressing Command and Space. In the search window type in Activity Monitor and hit Enter.

In Activity Monitor application, click on the Memory tab. Hover over the Memory Pressure box at the bottom of the app screen.

According to Apple, “memory pressure is indicator of system’s ability to meet the memory requirements” and higher memory pressure indicates the system performance may degrade.

On the screenshot below that was taken from my laptop, you can see that currently, only half of the available physical memory is being used: 3.9GB from available 8GB.

The box on the screenshot is green, which means there is no memory pressure on my MacBook. In the case of memory pressure, the box will turn red.

If there is no sufficient memory for my applications, for instance, I was using a memory hungry app, such as a video editing tool, then the computer would start swapping data from RAM to the hard drive.

Since the hard drive is significantly (50-500 times) slower than RAM, all operations will slow down and cause waits and frequent spinning wheels.

Additionally, all disk activities will also be affected because the hard drive has to provide support for memory functions, which cause further performance issues.

Unfortunately, this solution is not always possible. For the last several years, most MacBooks had their RAM soldered, which means you cannot extend the memory.

The only time when the upgrade is possible during purchase. I found a link that lists MacBook models that can be upgraded for a fee. To be clear, I am not suggesting to use their services, just use it as a tool to find upgrade eligibility.

Clean Disk Storage and Uninstall Unnecessary Apps

Less disk space available for memory means more frequent swapping. As a result, the computer will run even slower.

Additionally, a disk is required for other applications to store their temporary files, and a lack of space may cause application crashes.

So, the following are the tips to improved the disk usage.

Clean the primary storage periodically

As a rule of thumb, keep at least 10% or better 20% of the startup disk (the main Mac Drive) empty. This free space on startup drive is needed for memory swapping discussed above.

It is possible to clean the disk storage without any software. If you are interested in DIY option, I have a post on this topic.

Another option is to use cleaning applications. There are many of them, e.g. CleanMyMac and MacKeeper.

Uninstall apps you don’t need anymore

When you have a computer for a while, you naturally keep installing new applications. Very often, we forget about those and do not really need them anymore.

Unfortunately, they may still be running on the background and sucking up the CPU and memory. For instance, some people like to install different messaging tools starting with Skype and ending with Google Hangouts.

All these apps like to run on the background so they can notify you in case the new message has come.

But if you don’t need some of those tools, it’s a good idea to uninstall them to free up disk space, CPU, and memory resources.

In macOS, there is no standard uninstall procedure like in Windows. You simply move the app to the trash, and you’re done.

The problem with this approach is that the deleted program may have left some undeleted files on the disk. Some apps make sure that other apps are getting uninstalled correctly. Again, either CleanMyMac or AppCleaner could help you with that.

Reindex Spotlight Search

Spotlight Search is a wonderful tool that allows you to start an application without thinking where it is located. This speed, however, comes with a little downside.

In order to perform its function, the Spotlight Search needs to update its database continually, and it does it in the background.

To check if the Spotlight Search is a culprit of wheel-spinning start Activity Monitor and check for processes named mds, mdworker, and mdimport.

If one of the processes is consistently consuming a lot of CPU you may switch it off for specific drives or folders.

Run Apple Diagnostics Test

MacBooks and other Apple computers last a very long time compared to other brands. But even they become less efficient over time, especially the ones that had moving parts (HDDs instead of SSDs).

And broken or intermittently failing parts can cause a spinning wheel waits when the application is trying to communicate.

For instance, if the disk has bad sectors, then any app which tries to read data from it, will be stuck for a long time waiting for a response. Eventually, the app will either crash or hang up.

Every Mac comes with free built-in hardware diagnostics test.

To run it follow these steps:

Mac Spinning Wheel Fix

• Reboot the Mac
• While Mac is booting push and hold D key until you see a progress bar
• After progress bar pick the language from the list
• Hit Enter (Return) key
• Choose a Test to run

Turn Off Energy Saving Settings

Mac allows setting energy-saving parameters, and it is possible that you have changed those settings a while and completely forgot about them. However, there is a setting that puts hard disk to sleep and, as a result, causes a wait (and spinning wheel).

To check the settings, open Energy Saver settings by doing one of the following:

1. Click on the Apple logo in the menu bar in the top left screen and in a list that drops down click on System Parameters option. Then find and open the Energy Saver folder, which is represented with a light bulb icon.
2. Spotlight Search by pressing Command and Space. In the search window type in Energy Saver and hit Enter.

There is a setting called Put hard disks to sleep when possible in both Battery and Power Adapter modes. Uncheck that setting and prevent hard disk falling to sleep unexpectedly.

Replace Safari With Another Browser

One of the applications that routinely gets hung up on a color wheel is Safari.

Web browsers run HTML and Javascript from different web sites, and those scripts are not always best. Some browsers deal with imperfections in JavaScript better than others.

If Safari is an application that gets stuck with a spinning wheel, try a different browser like Google Chrome or Mozilla Firefox. Also, check Safari for possible adware.

Some users report that by simply switching from one browser to another, they get rid of spinning wheels for a long time.

Enable Software Updates

macOS is built by programmers, and even best programmers introduce bugs. That’s why it’s a good idea to have auto-update turned on.

In case if it was turned on, your Mac tries to get the latest updates and see if they fix the problems.

Wheel Spinning On Mac

To enable automatics updates, open System Preferences and tap on Software Update icon.

Make sure that “Automatically keep my Mac up to date” option is enabled. Also click on “Advanced” button and enable all options.

Apple Mac Spinning Wheel

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