Hi all,
When I launch Mail, it’s taking several minutes to open. I have 11 different mailboxes (Apple, Gmail, Yahoo, personal domains, etc.), but that has never been an issue until very recently. I don’t know if there’s a specific mailbox that’s causing the issues or not. I’ve thought about rebuilding each mailbox, but wanted to see if there were other suggestions, before doing so.
Running Ventura 13.1, Mail 16.0 on a 2019 MacBook Pro.
Cheers
There’s a macOS issue, made worse in Ventura, where Mail will pause for increasingly long periods of time before it begins loading any plug-ins that you have installed. (Basically, it is replaying the history of all the file system events since the last time a plug-in was enabled.) You can work around this by temporarily disabling and then re-enabling the plug-ins as described here.
If you don’t have plug-ins installed, the second most common reason I’ve seen for slow launching is problems with the system Contacts database. You can use the Activity Monitor app to record a “sample” from Mail while it’s launching to see what it’s busy doing.
HI Michael,
Thank you for sharing your expert knowledge. I disabled the 2 mail plugins, and relaunched Mail, but it still took a few minutes to launch. I then looked at a sample from Mail in Activity Monitor, and see several instances of “contact”, but I’m not exactly sure what that means. Is it normal to see these instances?
Cheers
I had the same problem in Monterey 12.6.3 - several minutes to launch mail. The only thing which worked was removing the following file: ~/Library/Application Support/Mail/Plug-ins/Bundles/Library/Mail/Bundles/Properties.plist. I very small file, but after removing it launch was nearly instantaneous. No adverse side effects that I could detect. This hint was from MacRumors.
Hope this helps. It was almost magical for me.
I had this same issue, with or without my SpamSieve plugin installed, ever since updating to 13.1. What fixed it for me was updating to 13.2. Now Apple Mail launches nearly instantly.
I’m not saying Apple “fixed” anything concerning Mail in that update. Just that updating changed something on my Mac Studio that fixed the issue. So obviously YMMV since this was a sort of voodoo “fix”. But it’s worth a try, especially since you’ll probably be updating to 13.2 at some point for the security fixes.
It depends on the text and numbers around them. Could you post the sample?
This is the file where Mail stores the file system event ID. It used to not be accessible to users, but in recent versions it is. It seems like deleting it will cause Mail to regenerate the file with a new ID, so that there are fewer file system events to go through at the next launch, and the plug-ins stay enabled. It seems like this is a faster way of doing what I suggested, though I don’t know whether there are other consequences to manipulating the file directly rather than through Mail’s interface.
The instructions for Slow Launching at the link you give are for SpamSieve. How would they differ for another plug-in? (I am running Mail Perspectives.)
Thank you,
David
@mjtsai, please find a little bit of text that contains “Contacts”. I have no real clue what is being noted in the text.
0x7ff82e331000 - 0x7ff82e3b7ffc com.apple.Contacts.ContactsUICore (1.0 - 3473) <5A45923E-19F6-3570-9B16-B22E52B8D61F> /System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/ContactsUICore.framework/Versions/A/ContactsUICore
0x7ff82e3b8000 - 0x7ff82e4ffff5 com.apple.ContactsUI (11.0 - 2538.1.1) <CA9883EB-0E61-338F-8915-33316C56B7CF> /System/Library/Frameworks/ContactsUI.framework/Versions/A/ContactsUI
0x7ff82e500000 - 0x7ff82e549ff7 com.apple.contacts.ContactsAutocomplete (1.0 - 1196) <F4ACD476-C99F-34E6-B2EC-D862F4D5EE3D> /System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/ContactsAutocomplete.framework/Versions/A/ContactsAutocomplete
0x7ff82e54a000 - 0x7ff82e556ff7 com.apple.KerberosHelper (4.0 - 1.0) <3221D5EC-7355-3DCF-A61F-C8B2FA31E5AF> /System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/KerberosHelper.framework/Versions/A/KerberosHelper
0x7ff82e59e000 - 0x7ff82e5c3fff com.apple.proactive.support.ProactiveEventTracker (1.0 - 365.3) <27F8C413-A342-3FE7-92C2-A22AE03EA323> /System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/ProactiveEventTracker.framework/Versions/A/ProactiveEventTracker
0x7ff82e86c000 - 0x7ff82e9dbff1 com.apple.CalendarUI (8.0 - 1138.3.3) <9E8324C4-04A4-30D2-8810-7186CE42759C> /System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/CalendarUI.framework/Versions/A/CalendarUI
0x7ff82eabc000 - 0x7ff82eac3ffa com.apple.OSAServicesClient (1.0 - 1) <89847992-E310-3D4D-869D-C273ABBE21B4> /System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/OSAServicesClient.framework/Versions/A/OSAServicesClient
0x7ff82eac4000 - 0x7ff82eafbff0 com.apple.framework.accountsui (1.0 - 134) <B0355A82-369B-336A-AE7D-05C3F6AB1224> /System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/AccountsUI.framework/Versions/A/AccountsUI
0x7ff82eafc000 - 0x7ff82eafcff2 com.apple.PhoneNumbers (1.0 - 1) <FC851E7C-3A50-3214-A2E6-E05060707293> /System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/PhoneNumbers.framework/Versions/A/PhoneNumbers
0x7ff82eafd000 - 0x7ff82eb04ff9 com.apple.URLFormatting (212 - 212.11) <BB406E72-D6A0-3A39-96EE-20E572A460EF> /System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/URLFormatting.framework/Versions/A/URLFormatting
0x7ff82eb05000 - 0x7ff82eb23ff3 com.apple.accessibility.AXCoreUtilities (1.0 - 1) <3076F37D-F29E-38AE-B2F5-B3804FAAA33F> /System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/AXCoreUtilities.framework/Versions/A/AXCoreUtilities
0x7ff82eb24000 - 0x7ff82eb4bffa libAccessibility.dylib (3007.18.9) <9CB48B15-8413-3D40-8635-BA088E570CB5> /usr/lib/libAccessibility.dylib
0x7ff82eb4c000 - 0x7ff83118bffd com.apple.WebCore (18614 - 18614.3.7.1.5) <60939488-81CF-3A18-A58F-337F75A78BFB> /System/Library/Frameworks/WebKit.framework/Versions/A/Frameworks/WebCore.framework/Versions/A/WebCore
0x7ff83118c000 - 0x7ff831257ff0 com.apple.PackageKit (3.0 - 1229) <1BCBBB0D-5F03-33B9-93EA-0A0189FE9FD6> /System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/PackageKit.framework/Versions/A/PackageKit
0x7ff911501000 - 0x7ff911530ff1 com.apple.quicklook.QuickLookSupport (1.0 - 170) <AA3FBB39-8C39-30D2-A607-9D5EBECACB24> /System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/QuickLookSupport.framework/Versions/A/QuickLookSupport
0x7ff911531000 - 0x7ff9115c4ff2 com.apple.AirPlaySync (1.0 - 3005.6.1.4.3) <5916EDA4-B57A-3A1C-8876-FB62285AA68F> /System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/AirPlaySync.framework/Versions/A/AirPlaySync
0x7ff9115c5000 - 0x7ff91169fff9 com.apple.siri.parsec.CoreParsec (1.0 - 3202.17.1) <AC9BCAF4-A9EA-36F3-ABEB-64F1EBE03502> /System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/CoreParsec.framework/Versions/A/CoreParsec
0x7ff9116a0000 - 0x7ff91180fff9 com.apple.TelephonyUtilities (1.0 - 1.0) <77F619D2-7CD3-3A64-BEB9-9694C0713B14> /System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/TelephonyUtilities.framework/Versions/A/TelephonyUtilities
0x7ff911810000 - 0x7ff91186affa com.apple.DeviceManagement (1.0 - 132) <A1259699-1650-3ED9-80CF-D063C41F9DB7> /System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/DeviceManagement.framework/Versions/A/DeviceManagement
0x7ff91186b000 - 0x7ff911871fff libswiftCoreGraphics.dylib (15) <6A0B3AB5-1896-320C-970E-9EB20D6A0076> /usr/lib/swift/libswiftCoreGraphics.dylib
0x7ff911872000 - 0x7ff91187bfff libswiftDarwin.dylib (??? - 5.7.1.134.4) <53801BF6-5F4C-3946-9F29-BF0950876A3F> /usr/lib/swift/libswiftDarwin.dylib
0x7ff9118a4000 - 0x7ff9118bbff1 com.apple.iCal.CalendarDraw (8.0 - 1833) <A1167619-C677-3959-80EA-E074E4770A0B> /System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/CalendarDraw.framework/Versions/A/CalendarDraw
0x7ff9118bc000 - 0x7ff9118dbff8 com.apple.ContactsAutocompleteUI (1.0 - 696.1) <B9BBB202-6161-303D-AF19-DF1BFF66BC77> /System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/ContactsAutocompleteUI.framework/Versions/A/ContactsAutocompleteUI
I just updated my MacBook Pro to MacOS 13.2, and Mail launched instantly. Yay! 
Please ignore my previous question about how the Slow Launching instructions you give would differ for plug-ins other than SpamSieve.
When I read the instructions more carefully, I saw that all I had to do was ignore the first and last items (unchecking and checking the SpamSieve rule).
I had a problem with mail taking minutes to launch. I have four or five email accounts. I thought is was SpamSieve, but removing that didn’t change anything. Remove any plug ins, no change. Rebuild every mailbox, no change.
The only thing that fixed it for me was nuking all traces of Apple Mail off my machine. All the stuff in the library file, all the caches, all of it. I then set it up as new and let the whole thing rebuild off the server.
Now, it is back to its instant self. I guess something was corrupted somewhere.
This removal of the ~/Library/Application Support/Mail/Plug-ins/Bundles/Library/Mail/Bundles/Properties.plist worked the charm for me! Thanks!!!
You would just uncheck it, restart Mail, and then check it again (i.e. Steps 2–3).
This is just showing which libraries are loaded into Mail. It’s meaningless as far as determining the reason for the slowness. That information would be in the top part of the sample log.
If anyone else is in this situation, I would try quitting Mail and removing the Envelope Index files, as that might help and would be easier than nuking everything.
I had the issue myself…got rid of the plist file mentioned and then went to manage add ins or whatever the name is. SpamSieve was there and checked but there were two older versions of the DEvonThink plugin that were grayed out and both unchecked and uncheckable. Hovering over them showed a different location so exited Mail and deleted them from that old location…Mail launches much faster now.