OS X Catalina - Dock has disappeared

Running First Aid in the Disk Utility helped me, as well. Killall Dock would bring the dock back but the dock was gone again after the next restart. First Aid seems to have fixed this as the dock was there after rebooting today.

This was the same that worked for me. I REALLY hate the move, Apple... I REALLY hate the move...

So not only do we have to swipe/click one more time for our system dock, but now we have to go into our account on the App Store with our phones in order see apps ready for an update. More clicks to get your users where they want to be is the *WRONG* direction, Apple. Sorely disappointed by this lack of forethought release for MacOS, iPadOS AND iOS... :(

I hope the next release improves user experience...

Apple is genuinely ******* me off. Just upgraded to catalina a few days ago. Using my dock with relevant apps on the bottom FOR YEARS. Worked perfectly till their OS developers completely fucked it all up and now it's gone. Clicking on self-explanatory controls for Dock in system preferences does nothing. One time it appeared back. I thought it was solved. I restarted the machine just to make sure - now it's gone again. Congrats apple for throwing your quality standards out the window and wasting my time. SMH.

After I posted this issue, update 10.15 was released and it was solved, so I thought. This morning again, the dock has disappeared. I used the terminal command posted below to reset the dock. Has anyone experienced the issue again after execute the terminal dock reset command? Thanks.

I have the same issue with the dock plus the "do not disturb" is reset to "on" every time after a reboot. I tried all the fixes described here in addition to spending several hours on the phone with Apple support to no avail. I am kind of responsible for my issues because for the first time ever I updated MACOS the easy way instead of erasing the hard drive, installing MACOS from a USB and then using time machine or a clone to copy the apps. I learned my lesson and I reinstalled it. Everything is working just fine now.

I've seen this as well. The Dock process is running but it does not present the UI for some reason. If I kill the Dock process either using Terminal or using Activity Monitor, the Dock process will restart and does present the dock UI.

Open Terminal.app and enter following commands:

defaults delete com.apple.Dock autohide && killall Dock

For some reason a bad setting slips in the Dock preferences file and cannot be changed using system preferences. This will revert it to default.

Yes, I'm having the same issue after upgrading to Catalina on my 2017 MacBook. The only way I can get the dock back is to "Restart". Then it appears. However after "Shut down", the next time I boot up the dock is again gone and won't appear until I "Restart". Seems like a bug.

After I got the latest update it seemed at first to have been fixed, but again after every shutdown, the dock is missing. Now I tried the 4-finger-drag and it appears. Doesn't stay visible, but at least I get it out when I need it. I'd rather have it fixed tho.

Not Solved.

For me at least. I still have this problem on my 2017 iMac running Catalina.

Every time I restart the dock disappear. If I run the terminal command below to reset the dock it works fine. But then disappears again after a restart.

defaults write com.apple.dock autohide -bool false; killall Dock

The problem is that after dock reset, it appears in its default setup with all the Apple apps etc.

Not the setup I prefer.

Try 'unhiding' the dock, so it is always visible ... that worked for me after the defaults write com.apple.dock autohide -bool false; killall Dock ... but having to rebuild it was a pain!! Now if I can just get the folder icons back!!! Seems no one has solved that one yet ... Catalina obviously came out w/o sufficient testing!!

The command you're referring to shouldn't reset the dock, only turn off the autohide function. There's one other oneliner here in the replies that sure does reset the dock... If you tried that one first, I suppose that's why the dock is reset...

So for clarity:

Reset dock back to its defaults:

defaults delete com.apple.dock; killall Dock

Just turn off autohide, but keep current preferences:

defaults write com.apple.dock autohide -bool false; killall Dock

And as the "solution" points out, it might help starting the system with the second monitor disconnected. But let's hope the latest release fixes this issue!

Good catch! You are right. My fault. I pasted the wrong command. I have been trying different variations many times since the problems started to occur.

defaults delete com.apple.dock; killall Dock

... does not solve my problem either unfortunately.

I apologies if I have posted in the wrong thread. I do not have a second monitor connected at all. The Dock disappearing is an issue on my iMac without any peripheral displays.

Had the same issue, testing back and forth and came to the conclusion that every time I use my Logitech mouse the dock disappears. Running only track pad for now and the dock hasn't disappeared yet again at least.

The latest update seems to have resolved the issue. I think it is linked to peripheral devices, I saw several people mention having a second screen (which I do not) and another speaking about a Logitech mouse (which I have). Either way, glad it's fixed.