Tap anywhere outside the stack of app cards to cancel the app-closing mode. You can also swipe up on the cards to close apps, but only once the red circles are showing. Swiping up on an app any. If somehow you fail to quit an unresponsive application, then do not worry. You still have other options to do so. Once you fail to close a crashed app using your keyboard, you can try force closing by using 'Apple Menu'. To force close using 'Apple Menu', follow these steps: At the upper-left corner of Mac screen, you will find the 'Apple' icon.
The rainbow-colored circle is a painful sight to see for Mac users. If you’re lucky it disappears in a few seconds, but more often it remains for minutes, leaving you helplessly locked out of the app or your whole Mac. Since it’s not always clear how to deal with with the wheeling cursor or what caused it in the first place, let’s break it all down. In this article we’ll take a look at what is the spinning beach ball, why and when it shows up, and what you can do about it.
What is a spinning color wheel?
Initially, it’s a system indicator. It’s official name is the Spinning Wait Cursor, not so official — the Spinning Beach Ball of Death or SBBOD. The ball signifies that your Mac cannot handle all the tasks given to it at this moment.
Every app on your Mac has a so-called window server. When an app receives more events than it can process, the window server automatically shows you the spinning ball. It usually takes about 4 seconds for the app to decide that it’s non-responsive.
Why does the Mac spinning wheel of death appear?
Well, the reasons are countless. First, it can be a stand-alone issue with a certain app. Second, it could be faulty hardware or insufficient RAM. We’ll go over each possible issue and see how it can be fixed, depending on the cause. Sometimes, the only way out it getting a new Mac, but most of the cases can be fixed with the right software or system commands.
How to stop the spinning ball on Mac?
In case you just need unlock one frozen application, that’s a job for Force Quit.
To fix an application stuck with a spinning cursor right now:
- Click the Apple icon in the top left corner.
- Choose Force Quit (or press cmd+alt+esc).
- Select the app that won’t respond.
- Click Force Quit.
Simply shutting down the process is a brutal way of problem solving and it doesn’t address the issue that caused the freezing. It could have been an accidental glitch in the program, but if it keeps freezing or spreads further to other software and services, you need to look deeper.
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What if the application keeps freezing when you open it again?
Reset or reinstall the freezing application. Macs don’t have a proper uninstaller and moving applications to the Trash bin leaves plenty of app leftovers. Some of them could be the reason why the spinning wheel showed up, so if you leave them the issue will stay.
How to reset a Mac app to its default settings or uninstall it
There are two ways to reset apps: one would be to use application’s own preferences or settings and look for reset options there. But in case the app won’t let you do that (because it keeps freezing), you can turn to third-party solutions, like CleanMyMac X for instance. It’s a handy app for Mac maintenance and cleaning with plenty of useful tools, including reset and uninstallation.
- Download CleanMyMac X, an app for Mac maintenance.
- Open it and click on the Uninstaller.
- Select the app you need to reset from the list.
- Click on the small arrow next to the application icon
- Click Applications Reset.
If the beach ball keeps rolling when you use the app again, reinstall it completely by pressing Uninstall instead or Reset. Remember, simply moving the app to the Trash doesn’t do the trick, since its leftover files remain on your hard drive.
Important: Modular synth app mac. if you have a licence for the paid app, makes sure to save the number somewhere.
What if your whole Mac becomes unresponsive?
Possible issue: Overworked processor
One of the reasons for the wheel to show up could be that your Mac is getting old. You can figure out if that’s the case by checking the CPU usage. To check the CPU usage, turn to Activity monitor. Find it in the Applications/Utilities folder or run a Spotlight search. Or, if you have CleanMyMac X, use it’s Menu in the top bar.
The bottom table shows System load in percentage. If it’s way above 50% and remains there for long, especially without any specific reason like games or heavy rendering programs, this might be the signal your processor is the bottleneck.
Fix: If your processor is overworking regularly, only buying a new Mac will fix the problem entirely. Sorry.
Possible issue: Low disk space
You don’t even need to have a full startup disk to see the nasty ball. Just a heavily loaded hard drive, with lots of large files can already cause troubles with loading.
Fix: Hard drive cleanup. Thankfully, that’s an easy task. You can get CleanMyMac X and in free up tons of space in a few minutes. With CleanMyMac you don’t need to dig into folders and look for files you don’t need, the app will find and sort them, plus all the system junk your Mac has been accumulating for months.
Possible issue: Insufficient RAM
Another possible hardware issue is insufficient Random Access Memory. To figure out if you need more RAM, open the Activity Monitor again. It’s in the Applications/Utilities folder. In the Memory tab, you can see Memory pressure table with a graph. How to install a app on mac. If the graph is red and your memory is constantly strained under all the running apps, you’ve found the problem.
Fix: You can upgrade RAM by buying and installing more of it. It’s usually enough to have 8 GB for most tasks and applications, apart from heavy video rendering and the likes. Here’s a detailed guide on how to upgrade RAM on Mac.
That’s about it concerning the spinning beach ball and how to deal with it. We hope this guide has been of help and you’ll stop the spinning wheel of death on your Mac once and for all.
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By Nathan E. Malpass, Last updated: August 27, 2019
Frozen program bothering you all day long? Well look no further than this guide on how to close a program on Mac
There’s nothing worse than getting into the groove of things, maybe you were winning a game or perhaps you were really making great headway with your workload for school or work and then for some reason or another the screen freezes on you. There’s nothing more infuriating and off-putting than to stare at a nonresponsive screen. Lucky for you there’s a way this article is a how-to force close a program on Mac and it can help you get rid of that pesky locked screen.
Now since you are looking for ways on how to force a program to close on a Mac, it would be good to know that there are several methods to do this and all of them will likely help you with your problem. We will tackle them one by one and you can test them as it happens.
1. Close A Program with Apple Menu
This is what Apple suggests to use when you are looking for top methods on how to frozen program on Mac. It is a pretty easy method and usually should work for most users. Simply follow the steps below and you should be saying goodbye to that frozen window with a few easy steps.
Step 1: Click on the Apple menu and find the Force Quit option
Step 2: After pressing the Force Quit option, you should see a new Force Quit window that will open up, it should have all the names of the programs running at the moment
Step 3: Highlight the program you want to Force Quit and press the button, then you are done
2. Close A Program with Mac Shortcut
Perhaps you are too angry at your mouse and want to ignore it or you threw it against the wall in frustration, please don’t do the latter, or maybe even the mouse is frozen because of the program, well, this might be the option for you among all the how to close a program on Mac options here.
Step 1: Press the following buttons altogether Command + Option + Esc, this will open the Force Quit window
Step 2: Once more choose and highlight the program or app you want to forcibly close
Step 3: Press the Force Quit button and that should just about finish your problems
3. Close A Program with Activity Monitor
Now if you just switched from a Windows operating system to a Mac just lately, you might be more comfortable using the Activity Monitor. The Activity Monitor is a surprisingly similar program to the Task Manager that Windows operating systems use and if you prefer this option, it shouldn’t be a problem at all either. Take these steps to open and use the Activity Monitor.
Step 1: Open the Activity Monitor by going on your Finder and search for the Applications, move on to Utilities and there you will see Activity Monitor. Of course, if you are familiar and use the Spotlight search then you can simply type in Activity Monitor and you should gain access to it right away
Step 2: There are several sections here but the leftmost is what you’ll likely need. That window should have a list of the programs and processes that are running and for sure your crashed program is among them. Highlight said program and proceed to the next step
Step 3: While the selected frozen program is highlighted, press the Quit Process button and you should finally close that program
4. Close A Program with Dock Panel
As opposed to the Closing a program with a Mac Shortcut option listed as second on this how to force close a program on Mac, this one relies on your mouse or touchpad. Take these steps to get that program to stop running.
Step 1: Bring your pointer down to the dock and find that program that is giving you trouble
Step 2: Click on it and a list of options should open up. You’ll notice that the Quit option that is usually found on the bottom of the programs usually has been changed to Force Quit. The system has likely recognized the error but needs a command to forcibly shut the door on the program, highlight the Force Quit
Step 3: Simply press to help your Mac to decidedly slam the door on the said program
5. Close A Program with Terminal
Now assuming you do enjoy working with the Terminal and want to use it, of course, the Terminal has the capability to shut down a program. This process is shockingly easy and a good option on this list of how to force a program close on Mac. Take these steps to make sure that the rebellious program gets shut down hard.
Step 1: Open the terminal, you can use the Finder, a shortcut or even Spotlight Search to open up the terminal, whatever your choice is all of them should open that black little window on your screen
Step 2: Type out this command - killall [application name]. Here is where it gets a little tricky, as you need to know the program’s exact name. Usually it can be found on the title bar of the unresponsive program but there are exceptions to that, however, it shouldn’t be too impossible to figure out all together
Step 3: After finding and typing out the right name, press enter to input the command and it should just about do the trick
6. Close A Program with Restarting Your Mac
There are times that a program can be a real handful, in fact, you’ve tried a few of the steps above on how to close a frozen program on Mac but still, it won’t work. When all else fails, it might be time to restart your Mac altogether.
![How To Close Out Apps On Mac How To Close Out Apps On Mac](/uploads/1/3/4/1/134186059/801076899.jpg)
Sure, the program is still open as you restart the Mac but it won’t be open when you get back, will it? Instead of steps for this one, let’s list down the methods on how you can actually restart the Mac.
How to remove old macos apps. Option 1: Press the power button and when the window opens up, simply choose Restart and the rest is history
Option 2: Find the Apple menu and scroll down to the Restart option to get your Mac to shut down and start up again
![How to close apps on macbook pro How to close apps on macbook pro](/uploads/1/3/4/1/134186059/398579894.png)
Option 3: One of the best methods as it even works when the entire Mac is frozen still and refuses to comply with any input or press of the keyboard or mouse. Press the following altogether Control + Command + Power Button and that should do the trick
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7. Close A Program with Factory Settings
Alright, admittedly this is pretty extreme option among all of the other choices on this how to close a program on Mac, however, it will do the job and then some. Again, this is the last resort and should only be used if a number of programs continue to crash and you have experienced this happening time and time again, which is strange as Macs are known to be quite stable in most options. Now, if you are really going to go through with this option, it would be ideal that you back everything up, assuming you have stuff that needs to be saved, which most likely, you do. After that is done, take these steps to complete the reset the factory settings of your Mac.
Step 1: Restart your Mac, please use any of the options mentioned in the prior step in order to get your Mac to shut down and boot up
Step 2: Make sure to press and hold the following buttons - Command + R, this will have your MacOS utilities window to open
Step 3: Find the Disk Utility option and continue forward
How To Close An App On Mac
Step 4: Find your startup disk somewhere on the left side and choose the option Erase
Step 5: You can now proceed to open the Format menu and then simply find the option of Mac OS Extended, enter a name in the middle, and click Erase
Step 6: At this point, you can quit Disk Utility
Step 7: When presented with the option, choose the Reinstall MacOS and follow the instructions as they come along, then you should be rid of that frozen program
After all of that, you can now see that there are several methods open to you on how to force close a program on Mac. All of them are viable options and the last option, in fact, is quite extreme. However, it is also good to note if a particular program is giving you a problem quite often it might be best to uninstall it completely and start all over. There are many ways to do this but PowerMyMac - Uninstaller is capable of remedying that problem as quickly as a few steps while having many other nice and nifty options to help you maximize the use of your Mac.
>Tricks >TOP 7 Ways: How to Close A Program on Mac
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