Fix a broken or slow Apple iMac

Why is my iMac so slow?

Believe it or not, you are not alone. It's the top suggestion on Google search, and there are over 7 million results. People are looking for the same answers as you are.

We help more than 250 Mac users every month and of those customers who a left a review, 96% of them gave us 5 star reviews. That's because we know Macs. We've been working with them for years, and make sure that our technicians are certified by Apple so that they know Macs at least as well as the technicians who work at the Apple Store.

There's not one single reason that Macs get slow, and there are lots of things you can try at home to boost the performance too. We'll show you a few things to try, but if you find that they haven't helped, it's time to let the experts take over. You don't need an appointment, so you can visit a SimplyFixIt store today. If you'd like to know more before you make the journey along, you can use the Contact Form below to get some extra help.

What can I do at home to improve the performance of my iMac?

The first step is to identify if perhaps there is just too much going on. Here are some steps you can follow to access the Apple Activity Monitor. It will break each task down by how taxing it is being on your processor at any given time.

1. Open Activity Monitor, then choose View > All Processes.

2. Click the top of the "% CPU" column to sort by the percentage of CPU capability used by each process.

Apps normally use a larger percentage of the CPU when doing tasks that require intensive calculations, such as video editing. But CPU use should decrease when the task is finished, and it should stop entirely when the app is no longer open. Any process except kernel_task (kernel_task is to help manage CPU temperature) that is consistently using more than 70 percent of your CPU is putting a significant load on the CPU and could be malfunctioning.

Quit any malfunctioning processes

If you can't quit an application normally, because it has crashed, you can use Activity Monitor to force it to quit. Make sure you save any work you have open first, just in case, then select the process in Activity Monitor and choose View > Quit Process.

Use Activity Monitor to check memory (RAM) activity

The Memory pane shows information about how memory is being used by each application:

Memory Pressure: The Memory Pressure graph helps illustrate the availability of memory resources:

o Green: All good. You have plenty RAM available.

o Yellow: You have RAM available, but certain tasks are working hard.

o Red: Memory resources have depleted. This is the most important indicator that your Mac may need to be upgraded with more RAM.

Physical Memory: This is how much memory you have installed in your iMac.

Memory Used: The total amount of memory currently used by all apps and macOS processes. If this figure is near the total amount of RAM available, you probably need to consider upgrading.

If your CPU is not being taxed, and your memory pressure is in the green, but your Mac is still slow - then this is not the problem. This indicates that both of these parts are capable at running faster, but they are not getting as much information as they’d like from your storage drive. We can upgrade your storage drive to something much quicker, which will really allow your CPU to take off. We are so confident you will love the new speed of your Mac, that if you don’t we’ll offer a no quibbles money back guarantee*

*The iMac must be returned within 14 days. We will swap the drive back for your old one and refund the money that you paid for the drive.

Is your iMac not loading Mac OS?

If your iMac powers up, but it fails to load Mac OS, we can help. There are a few common symptoms, but one we see a lot is the flashing folder and question mark.

This indicates that your iMac cannot see Mac OS or load the files correctly. A lot of people are quick to assume that this must mean that the hard drive is faulty - after all, that is where the files are stored. At SimplyFixIt, we run thorough hardware diagnostics to be absolutely certain - we won't charge you to replace a part that is in perfect health. And we often see similar issues due to a corrupt directory, which is cheaper to fix.

We also know how important your data can be. Our Mac certified technicians will offer data recovery too, even from a faulty hard drive. If you'd like more information, you can use the Contact Form below to get some extra help. Or pop in to your nearest SimplyFixIt branch. We'd love to say hi, and you don't need to book an appointment.