Looks like no one’s replied in a while. To start the conversation again, simply ask a new question.

Mac No administrator

I was the administrator before upgrading my mac from MacOS 10.14 to Big Sur. But after the upgrade. There is NO administrator for the computer anymore.


How do I retrieve the this?


i appreciate your help


emma

iMac 21.5″, macOS 11.6

Posted on Oct 13, 2021 12:46 PM

Reply
Question marked as Best reply

Posted on Oct 13, 2021 12:57 PM

Hi Emma, this happened to a few people on Upgrades, I suspect there was a tad of Disk Corruption before the start.


See if you can create a new administrator account by restarting the Setup Assistant:

  1. Boot into Single User Mode: Start/restart your Mac. As soon as you hear the startup tone, press and hold ⌘ + S until you see a black screen with white lettering. (If you end up back on the login screen after a flash of the black screen with white lettering, enter your password and it will return to the black screen.)
  2. Check and repair the drive by typing /sbin/fsck -fy then ↩ enter - as directed by the on-screen text.
  3. Mount the drive as read-write by typing /sbin/mount -uw / then ↩ enter.
  4. Remove the Apple Setup Done file by typing rm /var/db/.AppleSetupDone then ↩ enter.
  5. Reboot by typing reboot then ↩ enter.
  6. Complete the setup process, creating a new admin account.


Be very careful to notice the spaces in those Terminal Commands.


Once you've done that the computer reboots and it's like the first time you used the machine, except all your data will still be there. Your old accounts are all safe. From there you just change all other account passwords in the account preferences!!

1 reply
Question marked as Best reply

Oct 13, 2021 12:57 PM in response to eabulencia

Hi Emma, this happened to a few people on Upgrades, I suspect there was a tad of Disk Corruption before the start.


See if you can create a new administrator account by restarting the Setup Assistant:

  1. Boot into Single User Mode: Start/restart your Mac. As soon as you hear the startup tone, press and hold ⌘ + S until you see a black screen with white lettering. (If you end up back on the login screen after a flash of the black screen with white lettering, enter your password and it will return to the black screen.)
  2. Check and repair the drive by typing /sbin/fsck -fy then ↩ enter - as directed by the on-screen text.
  3. Mount the drive as read-write by typing /sbin/mount -uw / then ↩ enter.
  4. Remove the Apple Setup Done file by typing rm /var/db/.AppleSetupDone then ↩ enter.
  5. Reboot by typing reboot then ↩ enter.
  6. Complete the setup process, creating a new admin account.


Be very careful to notice the spaces in those Terminal Commands.


Once you've done that the computer reboots and it's like the first time you used the machine, except all your data will still be there. Your old accounts are all safe. From there you just change all other account passwords in the account preferences!!

Mac No administrator

Welcome to Apple Support Community
A forum where Apple customers help each other with their products. Get started with your Apple ID.