Finder Favorites Disappear on iMac running macOS Ventura

Give this a try: boot into Safe Mode according to How to use safe mode on your Mac and reset the Favorites. Reboot normally and and see if they remain or disappear again.

NOTE 1: Safe Mode boot can take up to 3 - 5 minutes as it's doing the following; 

• Verifies your startup disk and attempts to repair directory issues, if needed

• Loads only required kernel extensions (prevents 3rd party kernel/extensions from loading)

• Prevents Startup Items and Login Items from opening automatically

• Disables user-installed fonts 

• Deletes font caches, kernel cache, and other system cache files

NOTE 2: 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 insure a successful boot into Safe Mode.

I don't see any of the usual suspects in the report but do see some items of concern:

1 - WD software - if you're using to to control and manage your WD By Book it's not needed and can interfere with the system's disk management capability.

2 -  Duplicate Photos Finder (1.5.1) - if you're using that to find duplicate photos in your Photos library it can damage the library if you use it to delete the photos from the library. There's only two that I recommend, PowerPhotos and PhotoSweeper. They both are safe to use on a Photos library.

If you're using it to find and remove duplicate photos on your drive it can remove duplicates in apps and some systems icons that can also seriously affect stability and performance.

3 - RealVNC Limited - unless you're using a true VPN tunnel, such as between you and your employer's, school's or bank's servers, they provide false security from a privacy standpoint. 

I would remove the unnecessary apps according to the developer's instructions and 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 the mentioned software you'd do the following search(es): 

1 - Name contains macsfancontrol

2 - Name contains realvpn

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:  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.

Having the same issue here; finder sidebar in Ventura occasionally resets. Maybe once every two weeks... I've taken to storing shortcuts to all my current projects and regularly used folders there, so this is disruptive of my ability to work efficiently.

I reboot every day or two, tho I have not noticed a particular pattern as to when the resets take place.

Typically all (but sometimes only some of) my custom additions disappear, and also some of the finder-prefs checkboxes are also unchecked. It seems a bit random.

I have attempted a fix found in forums wherein I delete a sidebar .plist, run some terminal commands, restore an old .plist from timemachine or that I saved elsewhere; this works immediately / temporarily, but the resets have not stopped.

I will attempt

• a Safe Boot
• and also a finder prefs .plist deletion.

-j

That's good to hear. Keep up posted.

Download and run Etrecheck. 

Copy the report

and use the Additional Text button to paste the report in your reply.

Then we can examine the report and see if we can determine the cause of the problem.

A Safe Boot seems to be a catch all fix for a number of problems. I believe it's related to temporary cache/swap fees from different apps getting corrupted and the Safe Boot clears them out so they are created anew.

Glad it worked for you. We'll keep our 🤞

Does the issue also occur when using another account (session/user) on the Mac? I’m thinking that your Finder preferences settings file might be corrupted. Delete the file ~/Library/Preferences/com.apple.finder.plist and restart the Mac. Note that you’ll have to configure your Finder preferences again.

Do you have an iPhone that you sync with your Mac for emails and other items? If so if you delete them from the iPhone they get deleted from the Mac. Could this have a role in the disappearance?