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Finder sidebar icons not showing correctly

Hi all,


Some of the icons in my sidebar are not showing correctly.

Things I've tried so far:

  • Resetting PRAM
  • Checking in "Users & Groups" preferences to make sure that it's linked to the correct user file
  • Disabling Finder Extensions
  • Relaunching Finder


Nothing has helped so far. Any suggestions? You can see what I'm seeing below.



Thanks in advance!

MacBook, macOS 11.5

Posted on Aug 20, 2021 8:14 AM

Reply
Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Posted on Aug 20, 2021 9:03 AM

Hi, thanks for the reply.

Before I read your post, I tried un-checking and re-selecting the items in Finder > Preferences > Sidebar


Somehow that worked to restore all of the icons except the Desktop one, which remains a default folder.


Booting in Safe Mode didn’t make any difference.

2 replies
Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Aug 20, 2021 9:03 AM in response to D.I. Johnson

Hi, thanks for the reply.

Before I read your post, I tried un-checking and re-selecting the items in Finder > Preferences > Sidebar


Somehow that worked to restore all of the icons except the Desktop one, which remains a default folder.


Booting in Safe Mode didn’t make any difference.

Aug 20, 2021 8:47 AM in response to Aki_T

It sounds like something is confusing the OS. Since rebooting your Mac didn’t fix things, see if the problem still happens in Safe mode (hold the shift key down at startup). It can take much longer to safe boot (10 min) so be patient.

How to use safe mode on your Mac - Apple Support 


Safe mode forces the OS to clear certain caches and logs and do other miscellaneous housekeeping. It's non-destructive to user data so is safe to do. Very often certain weird software behavior is corrected by simply logging in this way as a troubleshooting method. When you're in safe boot, the machine will not be at its best performance, especially with graphics, but that's normal.


Does the problem persist while in Safe mode?

Exit safe mode by restarting your Mac normally and re-evaluate the issue again.

If the problem is still unresolved, please return here and post a reply and we’ll see what else we can come up with for help.

Finder sidebar icons not showing correctly

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