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Macbook Pro Running Slow After MacOS Update? (7 Reasons & Fixes)

David Baddeley
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When MacOS Catalina was released, everyone was happy with the new update. The new operating system was bringing in new features people have been waiting for a long time. Some of the notable features include the Dark Mode, a new App Store, and so much more. As you can imagine, many people would rush to get the new update considering it is free from Apple. However, just like any other operating system before it, Mojave update had its fair share of problems.

The Catalina update problems, mostly led to the degradation in performance of Macs. Most people would experience slower Macs than before. For someone who buys a MacBook Pro for fast speeds, this is not ideal. What are these problems? And how do you solve them? That is what we want to look at in this guide. Check out our list below of the top possible problems of Mac OS update.

1. Understand What is Causing Your MacBook Pro to Slow Down

The best way to deal with most of the Catalina update issues is to check out the Activity Monitor of your MacBook Pro. The Activity Monitor window shows all the different programs currently running on the device and the amount of resources they are taking up.

To access Activity Monitor is simple. Go to Applications and then Utilities to find it. Launch Activity Monitor from the Utilities folder.

Once the window is up and running, go through CPU, Memory, Disk, and Energy tabs at a time to see which apps are using the most resources. By clicking on each tab, make sure the list is arranged in a descending order. This will list the apps from which are using the most resources to the least.

Let us say it is the CPU tab, you would see the app taking the most usage of the CPU and thus slowing down your MacBook Pro. Once you identify the app, quit it from the Activity Monitor to speed up the device. The same applies to the other tabs. Close any apps hogging your RAM, disk space, and energy.

(Dark Mode)

Immediately after quitting some of these apps, the performance of your MacBook Pro becomes better. If it does not improve, then check out these other possible problems.

2. Unnecessary Launch Agents

Launch agents are important to some degree or else they would not be added to your MacOS. This does not mean we need all of them to start when the device is booting up. These launch agents aid some applications to start faster and they need to boot during the device boot up process. However, they can have an adverse effect on the bootup process. If they are too many launch agents to process, then your Mac OS might seem to slow down your MacBook Pro.

So, it is best to disable some of the Launch Agents from starting with every boot cycle.

If you want to disable these Launch Agents quickly, we recommend that you use CleanMyMac X software. This software has many other tools that we will look at later in this guide. For this part, we are interested in disabling some Launch Agents to make our MacBook Pro faster. Here is how you do it.

  • Once you have installed CleanMyMac X software, launch it to access the various tools of the software.
  • From its sidebar on the left, choose the Optimization option.
  • Click on Launch Agents tab
  • The program lists the programs under Launch Agents for you to disable. Most will be updaters of some of the installed apps. Disable the agent that you do not need by clicking on the green dot to the right of each of the agent.
  • If you want to remove the launch agent from the list, click on the check box beside it and then choose remove.

Once you have optimized this part, you should then restart the device. If you disabled several launch agents, then you should notice that the device is faster than before.

You can use the same process to disable the startup applications. They have the same effect on the bootup process of your device. This time around, click on Login Items and disable apps that start when logging into your account.

3. Spotlight Keeps Re-indexing Everything

Ever since the introduction of Spotlight, we have always found it easy to access the various files and apps on our devices. However, this tool can also lead to some undesired slowdown of your MacBook Pro after a Mac OS Update. Most people will set Spotlight to index everything on their Mac. Each time the tool has to re-index everything, then it would take a lot more time and consume a lot of resources. The result is that your Mac will slow down.

For this reason, it is best if you set the folders that you only want it to index. Follow these steps to get it done.

  • From the Apple menu, choose System Preferences
  • From the window that appears, click on Spotlight
  • Go ahead to select the Privacy tab from the next window
  • Proceed to drag and drop the folders that you do not need Spotlight to index in future
  • Once you are done, close the window.

This should save you more resources in the future to keep the MacBook Pro device working better even after a Mojave update.

4. Too Many Browser Tabs

It is no secret that browsers tend to take up a lot of memory whenever we use them. The worst is when we do not close the tabs we no longer use. When this happens, you end up with too many tabs taking up too much space in your RAM. When you run low on memory space, then the device also slows down.

You should make it a habit of closing those tabs you no longer need to free up more memory. For those who need to use the tabs later, it is best to bookmark and close them.

5. You Have Large Cache Files

Cache files are important to improve the speed of opening your apps. However, these files can pile over time, especially after an operating system update. Once these files are large, they end up taking a lot of unnecessary storage. With less space to work with, your Mac slows down even with the new Mojave update.

The solution to this problem is to clean up caches. Here are the steps you should take:

– Click Go on Finder
– Then choose Go to Folder
– Type “~/Library/Caches” then click Go to open the cache folder
– From the window that appears, select all the cache files and move to Trash
– To completely remove these files from your hard drive, empty Trash

6. Not Updating the OS and other Applications More Often

Whenever apps and your operating system get out of date, then you would end up with apps that are slower generally. This translates into your device also becoming slower too. It is why we recommend that you continually update your operating system and other applications whenever possible.

If you want your operating system to remain always up to date, consider turning on Automatic Updates in the App Store. You can do the same for the other applications installed on your device.

Sometimes the process of going through each up to update it can take longer. So, the CleanMyMac X tool comes in handy again. It is your best option if you want to install several updates at once.

Once you launch the application, click on Updater under the Applications category. The tool will go through the various apps and look for those with updates available. What is left is for you is to click on update and let it update the various apps on the device.

7. Not resetting NVRAM/PRAM more often

As suggested earlier, whenever the RAM of your device has less space to work with, then the device will become slower. It is now best if you reset the RAM to free up more space. Depending on the age of your device, some might have NVRAM while others PRAM. Do not worry as the reset process for either of them is the same.

Here is how you do it;

  • Turn off your MacBook Pro
  • Give it a few seconds and then turn it back on.
  • Immediately proceed to press Option, Command, R, and P keys at the same time
  • Keep holding these keys until your Mac restarts and then you hear a beeping sound
  • At this point, the memory reset process is done and your MacBook Pro should be faster

In Summary

We might not be able to cover all the possible causes and fixes in one post, but these are the most common. Once you tackle them, your MacBook Pro with the newest Mojave Update should be faster. An additional crucial consideration to solving your problem is that your device is compatible with MacOS Catalina. Sometimes people update their devices to newer operating systems, even when they are not compatible. Compatibility issues will always lead to more problems in terms of performance.