Unusually high CPU usage M4 Mac mini (EtreCheck report included)

First, there is no reason to ever install or run any 3rd party "cleaning", "optimizing", "speed-up", anti-virus, VPN or security apps on your Mac.  This documents describe what you need to know and do in order to protect your Mac: Effective defenses against malware and other threats - Apple Community and Recognize and avoid phishing messages, phony support calls, and other scams - Apple Support.  

There are no known viruses, i.e. self propagating, for Macs.  There are, however, adware and malware which require the user to install although unwittingly most of the time thru sneaky links, etc.   

Anti Virus developers try to group all types as viruses into their ad campaigns of fear.  They do a poor job of the detecting and isolating the adware and malware.  Since there are no viruses these apps use up a lot of system resources searching for what is non-existent and adversely affect system and app performance.

There is one app, Malwarebytes, which was developed by a long time contributor to these forums and a highly respected member of the computer security community, that is designed solely to seek out adware and known malware and remove it.  The free version is more than adequate for most users.  

That being said uninstall according to the developers' instructions, Microsoft Defender, Bitdefender and Avast Security.

You can check to see if you've removed all of the supporting files by downloading and running the shareware app Find Any File to search for any files with the application's or the developer's name in the file name.  For aforementioned software you'd do the following search(es): 

1 - Name contains Defender

2 - Name contains bitdefender

3 Names contains avast

Any files that are found can be dragged from the search results window to the Desktop or Trash bin in the Dock for deletion.

FAF can search areas that Spotlight can't like invisible folders, system folders and packages.  

If you get warnings that the file can't be deleted because it is in use or used by another app boot into Safe Mode according to How to use safe mode on your Mac and delete from there.

Note 1:  if you have a wireless keyboard with rechargeable batteries connect it with its charging cable before booting into Safe Mode.  This makes it act as a wired keyboard as will assure a successful boot into Safe Mode.

Note 2: Defender was mentioned twice in the report as using a lot of CPU resources.

As has been mentioned in replies above, remove all of the add-on security-related apps, add-on firewall apps, add-on VPN apps (outside of activities including geoshifting for website testing or CDN testing or other similar purposes), and anti-malware apps including Defender and Avast and Bitdefender. Defender end-point looks to be having issues, too.

For assistance with Objective-See apps, including for assistance with what those apps might or might not report, and anything else associated with or displayed by the Objective-See apps, contact Objective-See Support.

Turn off port stealthing, too. That serves no useful purpose beyond causing problems for IP routing.

+1 OT is 150% correct, please follow his instruction. Moving forward please NEVER EVER install any of the following types of third party apps:

• Antivirus
• Cleaning
• Security
• VPN
• Maintenance

By doing so you will be rewarded with a stable, fast and secure Mac. The only thing Mac OS needs in order stay fast, secure and stable is to keep it up to date and restart the computer about 1x per week.

First:

Drives:

disk0 - APPLE SSD AP0256Z 251.00 GB (Solid State - TRIM: Yes)

Internal Apple Fabric NVM Express

You bought the smallest storage option offered, and it is getting full. That does not help.

Video-conferencing can always be expected to show high CPU use. It is very heavy-duty use with commensurate demands on hardware, and cannot be avoided with buying a much more powerful computer

Looks like the software that came with your webcam is feeling hungry:

2025-06-17 13:33:36 OBSBOT_Center.app High CPU Use (3 times)

First occurrence: 2025-06-16 19:53:58

Executable: /Applications/OBSBOT_Center.app

Might want to contact OBSBOT support to see if this is normal.

High Spotlight activity like this:

2025-06-16 11:12:42 spotlightknowledged High CPU Use (6 times)

First occurrence: 2025-06-11 12:29:15

Executable:

may be due to the fact that, by default, Spotlight indexes far to many things that most people never search. Do System Settings > Spotlight and reduce the number of categories being searched. Mine looks like this: