overheating of MacBook Pro with macOS Tahoe 26

I noticed Visual Code was running like crazy which triggered my CPU fan. I uninstalled it and quit those apps from Activity Monitor. Probably same problem with you some apps are just not running right with the new OS.

My 10 month old MacBook Pro has been running so hot since OS26 install that it slows to a snails pace. The issue is that Spotlight Search is consuming all for my CPU. I've considered a reinstall and I looked for ways to disable Spotlight Search as I have never once used it. I could not find a way to disable it but I did find a way to neuter it. In Settings I turned off all of it's search ability, it's ability to search through every aspect of my computer. It was using over 200% of my CPU. Now it uses less than 1%. My Mac runs fast and completes every task with precision and speed, and best of all, my Mac runs very cool. After installing Tahoe my Mac was running hot even in sleep mode. Not so now! Problem solved! Apple needs to allow users to turn off Spotlight Search. It should be the user's choice, not something that is forced on us!

Me too, same issue. My MBP was on fire... but fire-hot... fans blowing all the time...

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I HAD to Switch Back to MacOS Sequoia 15.7

My Mac is now like 1000% faster... and "BACK TO NORMAL" !!!

For Tahoe, I tried everything,

even a full format and fresh install of MacOS Tahoe 26.01

with NOTHING else in the SSD !

This MBP is an intel i9 2.4ghz with 64GB RAM and 4TB SSD...

So it is NOT a slow machine... or with limited RAM or Drive...

The Problem is obviously in Tahoe itself...

It's rather better to be thinking that for some obscure reason the OS was rushed out and it still needs a ton of bugs and performance fixes...

if this is the new MacOS going forward, it is simply a disaster.

After you re-install a fresh sequoia, You have no idea...

Literally You have NO IDEA... how smooth and fast it is...

How good it is compared to Tahoe...

After 2 weeks using it, You start forgetting how was the same Mac Running on Sequoia.

I'm surprised that in the major websites all the reviewers are praising MacOS Tahoe, so much...

Unless they are all "paid-out" by the Big Apple, to deliver fake reviews...

there is no way Tahoe can be praised as it is...

I also have a Mac mini M4 and that one too the slow-down is heavy.

I had to reformat all the machines from an external USB and go back to a full fresh sequoia.

And then restoring my data.

As said above, tried Tahoe, with FULL fresh install of the OS on both the intel and M4 machines.

So no other apps, then what comes and ships with Tahoe.

Browsing with safari... SLOW

Right clicking on the dock on Safari to see the contextual menu... SLOW...

Like ... seconds... between the click and opening the menu...

On sequoia everything is INSTANT... immediate...

There are issues... too many issues.

As someone said in another post...

It's not a specific issue... it's the aggregate of bugs, issues, and performance drops...

Like death by a thousand cuts.

My advice to anyone... DO NOT UPDATE or "UPGRADE" to Tahoe.

It is NOT an Upgrade... not right now...

Going back to Sequoia IS an upgrade from Tahoe.

If the processors are getting hot, something is driving them. This does not seem to be a commonly reported issue, so most likely it's something (system extension, background process) running on your Mac that is causing problems with macOS 26. You can boot in Safe Mode to shut off 3rd party extensions and see if that solves the problem.

Start up your Mac in safe mode - Apple Support

Hello all—Since day one on macOS 26, I was genuinely excited to try the new update. Instead, I got spinning beachballs. My normal workflow (teaching from about 8 a.m. into the evening, night classes, a few Safari windows, Apple Pages for lesson planning/essays, Keynote, and Mail) suddenly felt like a 2000s laptop. macOS 15.6 ran perfectly for me, so I opened Activity Monitor and noticed Spotlight/coreSpotlightd using around 4 GB. After two weeks of this, on September 30, 2025, I dug in and found a clean fix that brought my M4 MacBook Air back to its usual speed.

If you’re seeing the same hot/slow behavior after the update, it’s likely a post-update indexing loop, not your hardware. You can keep all your tabs. Just reset Spotlight/Core Spotlight, restart once, and let the Mac finish a one-time reindex while plugged in (lid open). After that, memory pressure should stay green, swap near zero, and coreSpotlightd should idle under ~200 MB. Bonus polish: set Safari to reopen all windows from last session, limit heavy extensions (e.g., Grammarly) on Canvas/Docs/Brightspace only, set external displays to 60 Hz with HDR off, and keep Login Items lean.

# Terminal — copy/paste all lines

# Reset Spotlight (system-wide) and Core Spotlight (per-user) indexes

sudo mdutil -a -i off

sudo mdutil -Ea

sudo mdutil -a -i on

rm -rf ~/Library/Metadata/CoreSpotlight/*

killall -9 coreSpotlightd

# Reboot to finish cleanly

sudo shutdown -r now

#Quick spot-fix later, if needed :

# sudo mdutil -Ea && killall -9 coreSpotlightd && sudo shutdown -r now

I just wanted to share something I ran into with my setup that might help others.

One big cause of GPU heat on macOS Tehoe turned out to be the display resolution settings, especially if you’re running dual monitors. At first, I was running my two 27-inch 4K Samsung ViewFinity screens at a “scaled” resolution (the common 2560×1440 option) on Mac Mini M4 24/256. What I didn’t realize is that macOS actually renders those at a higher 5K buffer and then downsamples to 4K. That extra scaling was pushing my GPU harder than expected.

After I switched both monitors to run at their true native 3840×2160 resolution, the GPU load noticeably dropped. Even while working in Affinity apps, the utilization now sits around 70–75% instead of spiking higher.

So if you’re seeing GPU heat with multiple displays, it’s worth checking whether you’re using a scaled mode or the actual 4K native resolution. The difference in workload is real.

Update: I did some investigation and monitored my system. I noticed that WindowServer is constantly using around 20-40% CPU and 35-50% GPU. When the CPU usage goes over 30% and the GPU over 40%, my fans kick in and get really loud until I stop doing anything on the M2 MacBook Pro.

This drives me crazy because it never happened before. Sure, there were workflows that triggered the fans, but those were demanding apps like games or building an app in Xcode. Now I feel like I'm using a PC—it's loud, sluggish, and looks significantly worse than Sequoia.

I have had particular heating issues with intunemdm and teams since the upgrade to 26, killing mdm reduces the temp for around 12 hours until it goes nuts again.

We're getting problems across our whole fleet since the upgrade, the battery overheats and then stops charging.

A big pain......

In my case MAIL native application overheats laptop. it is just insane ! Reported 5 bugs to apple. They should fix it! no solution "like reduce apps" suitable for this bugs. Apple removed archives. MAIL client always attempting to upload something from somewhere, never stops. It should be fixed , no other options. it is BUG

I encountered the same issue and, after hours of research, I discovered that rendering the liquid glass UI is highly demanding on the CPU. I started disabling some of its features, and the first change I made—switching the screen background to a static one—had a significant impact on performance.

We are facing overheating issues with MacBook Air models M1, M2, M3, and M4 after upgrading to macOS Tahoe 26. Before the upgrade, our MacBooks were working fine on version 15.6 with no heating or hanging problems. Since the upgrade, the laptops are getting hot and running slow. If we restart the device, it works normally for a while, but the next day the same issue comes back, and we have to restart again. No third-party software is installed, either before or now. It seems like a bug, but we need a solution urgently as our school has 300 laptops, all on the latest OS (26). This problem has been going on for 5 days now.

I tried that. It won't work. This is what does work: My 10 month old MacBook Pro has been running so hot since OS26 install that it slows to a snails pace. The issue is that Spotlight Search is consuming all for my CPU. I've considered a reinstall and I looked for ways to disable Spotlight Search as I have never once used it. I could not find a way to disable it but I did find a way to neuter it. In Settings I turned off all of it's search ability, it's ability to search through every aspect of my computer. It was using over 200% of my CPU. Now it uses less than 1%. My Mac runs fast and completes every task with precision and speed, and best of all, my Mac runs very cool. After installing Tahoe my Mac was running hot even in sleep mode. Not so now! Problem solved! Apple needs to allow users to turn off Spotlight Search. It should be the user's choice, not something that is forced on us!

I have a new update seaking to solve the overheating issue while perserving the funtionality of Spotlight Search. Yesterday I wiped my hard drive and did a fresh install of OS Tahoe, preserving my files etc. via Time Machine. Success! I essentially have a new computer with a pristine operating system. I took off the restraints I placed on Spotlight Search and I've run multiple and compound processess including Spotlight searches and my MacBook is fast, cool and responsive with no applications or processesses gobling up CPU space. It appears that my neutering of Spotlight Search was only a bandaid on the problem and not a real cure.

My macbook pro m1 (2021) was running perfectly up until i installed macos 26 and now its overheating, my battery is draining with the speed of light. With Tahoe my mac was getting hot even on sleep mode and as soon as i open it its getting too hot to handle. I can't code on this thing, I can't do editing on this thing just because i trusted the new os version and upgraded to Macos 26 (Tahoe).