Accountsd CPU usage high in macOS Catalina

Based on what I'm seeing other people post, and my own experience of it (not too extreme a mail setup: 3 exchange accounts, 2 imaps, whatever iCloud uses), here's my summary:

1. The problem is in Catalina, as previous/other macOS versions don't seem to have the problem.
2. The problem seems to be linked to the Exchange accounts.
3. The problem seems to be triggered by interruptions to IP connectivity. There may be other causes (enabling/disabling my VPN seems to do it, sometimes).
4. The problem can be temporarily resolved by a number of ways: disabling the Exchange accounts, disabling the IMAP accounts (worked for me at least), creating a new user account, restarting, etc. But it always seems to come back.
5. A permanent fix has not been clearly identified (that I've seen).

Based on the above, and having encountered a problem like this on a SW project I was involved in, my guess is that there is some kind of bug in the error handling code associated with the Exchange interface. As in, there is an error in the connection, and accountsd goes haywire. The various temporary solutions work by breaking the trap that accountsd gets caught in, but when the error occurs again, it goes nuts again.

The good news to those suffering the problem: You ain't alone, and there are temporary fixes. The bad news: It's a subtle problem, and the root cause is not clearly identified.

Well, I'm now trying a combination setup:

• Mail using "add other email account", enabling app logins in gmail
• MacOS accounts has "Google" account, with only calendar and contacts enabled

Right now it's working, no accountsd CPU burning.

I've been using OSX since 5 years and never experienced this until 10.15.6. The problem stayed after upgrading to 10.15.7 and became regular. I've tried many of the advices around the net, and the following attempts sometimes helped, sometimes not:

• reboot
• from command line executing: defaults delete MobileMeAccounts

However, the following seems to be more successful even when I am signed in to iCloud: close Safari, then restart OSX.

I have no external mail service assigned. The only thing I know of, google calendar is set to sync with that of OSX. I am not sure if this explains my experience, perhaps somebody else knows the answer.

@christian222 - Do you see any kernal errors like the ones I outlined here. This specific error is what pointed me to the addressbook being corrupted. and once I applied the fix this error and all the other accountsd private errors stopped.

Mail is better but suggestd is still out of control and it's due to Mail.

I can reboot my computer, not start Mail and everything is fine--including suggestd. Once I start Mail then suggestd goes crazy...

I have a similar situation here on iMac Pro 3GHz 10-Core running OS X 10.15.4. 2 email accounts. 1 iCloud, 1 Exchange. accountsd seems to calm down on a sort of regular cycle depending on what I'm doing. It looks like it gets up to about 340% of CPU and stays there for about 45 seconds, then goes down to 0 and stays there for about 15 seconds, then shoots right back up to 340% roughly. It's not really consistent in that pattern though.

All of those CPU peaks and sustained highs are caused by accountsd with Mail and Safari open. The drop and sustained low at about 3/4ths in is where I closed Mail. Within a few minutes after closing Mail, even after re-opening Messages, CPU load from accountsd remains completely flat at near 0%. Just re-opening Mail does not cause the issue. You have to actually be active in Mail I believe to make it go crazy.

But all of this is just noise. I don't really understand why there hasn't been someone start a class-action lawsuit against Apple over this. I paid a lot of money for this setup and, with accountsd clearly being responsible for system-level behavior and consuming so much of available CPU most of the time, my experience becomes more akin to using a Windows box with 80 malware programs stealing CPU. Obviously Apple is aware of the problem. I don't know why they don't respond on this board, and I don't know why they don't fix the problem. It's unacceptable.

Within 5 minutes after updating to 10.15.5 my mail with all my accounts active (3x Office 365, 1x iCloud and 2x imap) the mail and accountsd were back to:

This issue is also not mentioned in the release notes for 10.15.5 so it seems time had come to abandon Apple Mail and start using an other mail client that does work!

just found out the same thing. My MacBook is plugged in during the night and it was pretty warm in the morning and I found out it is the Mail app that is the cause of this.

hope they solve this fast.

I have the same problem... suggestd is also consuming a massing amount of CPU time. Are you seeing that too? My laptop runs super hot and battery can't keep up. I opened a support ticket through the Feedback Assistant. I suggest you all do as well so they prioritize the issue. If it is of any help you can reference my ticket # FB7357141 for high CPU from Mac Mail and FB7401860 for high cpu from suggestd.

Hi,

I had the same issue. I spent a fair amount of time trying to figure out what the underlying issue was.

What resolved it for me in the end was to remove the Gmail account I have in my internet accounts.

I then removed any items in the keychain that were related to that account. I then added back the Gmail account in internet accounts, going through the re-authentication process etc, and everything was back to normal.

Disabling and re-enabling my Gmail account resolved the issue for a short time, but the issue returned.

I finally disabled my Gmail account as it was unworkable running mail.

Disabling my Gmail account has allowed me to use mail without the cpu running wild.

I am not sure what the root cause is, but I have 8 email accounts with numerous email services and I have narrowed it down to an issue with my Gmail account.

Try this - set your gmail to check for new email every minute rather than "Automatically". Not a great solution but seems to temper the accountsd CPU issue - or at least make it intermittent.

This can be found under -> Mail -> Preferences -> General ... The second drop down on the screen. It at least allows me to use my Mac and Mail without sluggishness (much).

So far, this seems to have fixed my high cpu problem. I have work email, Yahoo, and Gmail, so this setting is helping with the mix of email accounts I have. Thanks for the suggestion.

I set mine to check every 5 minutes.

For me changing "Check for new messages" to 1 minute didn't work enough. I have two Gmail accounts, one personal and one Business. The only alternative has been disabling both Gmail accounts from Mail, which it is a great inconvenience.

Did someone get a response from Apple?

Thank you,

I set my email to check for new messages every hour . I also did not provide account info for messages or iCloud . I don't use iCloud .

seems to have helped but it was till eating up memory until it maxed out the 8 gig on the machine .

I upgraded memory to the max this iMac would hold 16 Gig and also installed a ssd drive while I had it apart. After restoring back to right after the .1 update everything seems fine and memory usage seems normal and the cpu is barley being used .

on a note even though I have checked to check mail every hour I still get updates every five minutes or so .