3 and 4 Finger Gestures Stopped working in macOS Catalina

Question

3 and 4 Finger Gestures Stopped working in macOS Catalina

For some reason the 3 and 4 finger gestures on my 2019 MacBook Pro 16" have stopped working. This happened for some reason with macOS 10.15.4 installed, and after upgrading to 10.15.5 they still do not work. Turning gestures off and on again doesn't fix it. Restarting the machine doesn't fix it.

This isn't just affecting the 3 and 4 finger gestures of my Trackpad, but the 2 finger double tap on the magic mouse isn't working either. Is there a bug in recent versions of macOS here?

What can I do to get my trackpad and mouse gestures working again? This is extremely frustrating!

Thanks

MacBook Pro 16″, macOS 10.15

Posted on Jun 12, 2020 8:51 AM

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Answer 1

Best reply

basbasbasbas

Level 1

13 points

Jun 17, 2020 1:18 PM in response to crpietschmann

I had exactly the same thing! And indeed it worked under a new user. After some digging, I noticed that is was mission control that wouldn't start . So: Finder -> Applications -> Mission Control -> No response.

If you have this too, you can fix it like this:

➜ ~ defaults read com.apple.dock mcx-expose-disabled

1

1 = mission control disabled, then do:

➜ ~ defaults write com.apple.dock mcx-expose-disabled -bool FALSE

➜ ~ defaults read com.apple.dock mcx-expose-disabled

0

➜ ~ killall Dock

Background: Yesterday I did an online exam, the software crashed. I think their software (Pearson VUE test center) disabled mission control.

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Answer 2

Jun 17, 2020 1:29 PM in response to basbasbasbas

Thanks for this. You know I did take a Microsoft certification exam from home recently proctored by Pearson VUE. I bet their testing software did disable macOS Mission Control. Wow! I didn't even think about that. Thanks!

From now on, I'm going to create a separate user account that I use just for taking certification exams through Pearson VUE. (yes I do this on a semi-regular basis) This way if the Pearson VUE software messes anything up, it wont affect my primary user account that I need to get work done. This is probably a good thing to do from a security perspective anyway.

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Answer 3

chris_g1

Community Specialist

Jun 16, 2020 8:22 AM in response to crpietschmann

Hi crpietschmann,

Thank you for reaching out to Apple Support Communities.

I see that you have an issue with Multi-Touch gestures not working on your MacBook Pro. I want to help. To make sure that you are covering all the steps, this article explains how to Use Multi-Touch gestures on your Mac - Apple Support

If you still have an issue after reviewing the article, you can reset the SMC. Here’s How to reset the SMC of your Mac - Apple Support

If that doesn’t help, please reset the NVRAM. Here’s how to Reset NVRAM or PRAM on your Mac - Apple Support

I hope that helps.

Best Wishes!

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Answer 4

i_rina

Community Specialist

Jun 16, 2020 11:50 AM in response to crpietschmann

Hi crpietschmann,

Thank you for reaching back out to Apple Support Communities.

Does the issue happen in a test user or Safe mode? Here’s How to test an issue in another user account on your Mac - Apple Support

If the issue happens in a test user account, test in safe mode. Here’s how to How to use safe mode on your Mac - Apple Support

Here are a few quick notes about safe mode:

- Safe mode often looks and responds a bit different than what you're used to.

- Safe mode does not load everything that normally loads during a regular startup.

- Safe mode is a bit slower while loading and during normal operation as well.

- These differences can be cleared-up by a normal restart.

Test to see the issue happens in safe mode. Restart and test again in typical mode. Just booting into safe mode in and of itself can resolve some issues.

Hope that helps. Reach out with any questions.

Best Regards!

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Answer 5

brenden dv

Community Specialist

Jun 17, 2020 9:46 AM in response to crpietschmann

Hi crpietschmann,

Thank you for reaching back out to Apple Support Communities.

Both the SMC and NVRAM resets you performed earlier would reset settings. Since the issue doesn’t happen in a test user, you can check a few things that were mentioned in the Safe mode article we provided such as testing your login items: If your Mac has a blue screen or other startup problems - Apple Support

If that doesn’t help, you can reach out to Apple Support directly for further assistance here: Get Support

Have a great day!

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Answer 6

Jun 17, 2020 12:40 PM in response to brenden dv

I have also tried going into the "Library/Preferences" folder and deleting the following ".plist" preference files:

com.apple.AppleMultitouchMouse.plist
com.apple.AppleMultitouchTrackpad.plist
com.apple.driver.AppleHIDMouse.plist
com.apple.driver.AppleBluetoothMultitouch.trackpad.plist
com.apple.driver.AppleBluetoothMultitouch.mouse.plist

And, then resetting the PRAM / NVRAM again with no luck.

Well, based on Apple Supports latest reply to this thread they appear to have no idea either. So, consequentially, I guess I'll have to delete my local User Account and create a new User Account and sort of start fresh on this machine. Although I am thinking of just doing a Factory Reset just in case since I've spent WAY too much time on this issue already.

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Answer 7

Jun 16, 2020 9:50 AM in response to chris_g1

I have rest the SMC and NVRAM multiple times and my trackpad gestures still aren't working correctly.

Specifically, the Mission Control and Expose three finger gestures on the trackpad do not work anymore. Also, the two finger double tap for Mission Control on the Magic Mouse doesn't work either. Everything was working correctly until about the last week or so when these gestures stopped working, and no trackpad or mouse configuration was changed to cause it.

Is there another solution that could be tried to get these gestures working again?

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Answer 8

Jun 16, 2020 2:28 PM in response to i_rina

It's still not working. I did test in Safe Boot with my same user account and it doesn't work in safe boot or after restarting again normally. However, Guest user and a "test" user can use the gestures ok, so I guess it's not a hardware problem. Oh, and I did already try reinstalling macOS, with preserving user data, and that didn't fix it either.

Is there a way to reset the settings / configurations involved with Trackpad and Mouse gestures for this user account?

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3 and 4 Finger Gestures Stopped working in macOS Catalina

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