Monterey seems to not remember which display should show which windows after sleep wakeup

It might be because the external monitors turn on after the Mac does, I think that causes the OS to get confused.

This is kind of a fix for app windows:

Before you put your Mac to sleep go to Finder/Hide Others, then after wake click on each app in the dock and they'll be in the place where you left them. It works for me anyway.

okay. this makes so much sense as to why the windows fail. also, it seems like it's going yo be hard for apple to fix. anyway, i have just one minor addition. after wake up, you can get all the windows back with finder->show all. at least that works for me. now all i have to do is remember to hide others before sleep mode. thank you.

Bump.

2020 M1 mbp, didn't have a problem on Big Sur, upgraded to Monterey and suddenly has the issue. Monitor plugged into hdmi through a dongle. Super annoying.

Also the fact that the app windows don't seem to snap to fit to the desktops on the display when I drag them over in Mission Control view is slightly extra annoying too; they're always a few inches below the display window itself. Nitpicky, but it didn't happen before.

I haven't been able to replicate it consistently yet with my M1Pro 2021 mbp on Monterey however, but it does happen. Maybe I just haven't given it enough time while sleeping every time I test. Or maybe there's some variability with using the dongle vs the hdmi port.

i tried this workaround and it "mostly" works. a few windows wandered to other displays, but most stuck. the workaround posted earlier by jon hitchcock works better, but it's only a matter of time before i forget the hide all and have a window relocation reconstruction project :-)

Update, I don't know if I remember seeing it in this thread, but the issue doesn't occur if the laptop goes to sleep while plugged into power. So maybe it's some weird interaction with the port(s) losing power in battery mode when the computer goes to sleep?

The monitor is obviously powered on its own, but just spitballing here

That's not what I'm seeing on my setup. I always leave my MBP14 plugged in and still get windows roulette every morning. Now I am getting the power through a hub so maybe something in that. Maybe I'll try a few experiments to see what happens if I run the power straight in.

Jon Hitchcock wrote:

It might be because the external monitors turn on after the Mac does, I think that causes the OS to get confused.

This is kind of a fix for app windows:

Before you put your Mac to sleep go to Finder/Hide Others, then after wake click on each app in the dock and they'll be in the place where you left them. It works for me anyway.

This tip seemed to be the solution, but I'm a "hide others" freak. I always did that, even before Monterey and this annoying bug, and I'm still having it.

Apparently, like someone said, most of the time, the MacBook wakes up and doesn't "know" it is connected to an external monitor. Then it shows the windows in the position they'd be in the integrated monitor (always positioned in the bottom left corner). Occasionally, the windows will show where I left them before the MacBook went to sleep, which probably happens because the computer "realizes" it is connected to an external monitor. Couldn't figure out why it's not persistent.

Same issue brand new MacBook Pro 16 Maxed out, my main 4k monitor wakes a little later and all the safari or Firefox screens have either jumped to the MacBook monitor or have resized to the MacBook resolution on the 4k monitor (as in the safari browser snaps to the bottom left of the 4k monitor and retains the same small size and aspect ratio of the MacBook monitor). It also screws with my Adobe Illustrator and After Effects palettes set up on the laptop monitor, I have to reset my custom viewport every single time.

I'm new to MacOS and it's awesome but this windows constantly rearranging is super duper undesirable. I run three displays, 2 external LGs. With Debian and Ubu, I could fix the unfixable with terminal commands. I'm not sure if Apple permits such tinkering but I'm willing to try if that's what's required. I have Apple Care and I think that means I can call so I guess I'm going to do that because I haven't found the answer on the interwebs.

Does anything look out of place below?

SPECS

----------------

 Chipset Model: Apple M1 Pro

 Type: GPU

 Bus: Built-In

 Total Number of Cores: 16

 Vendor: Apple (0x106b)

 Metal Family: Supported, Metal GPUFamily Apple 7

 Displays:

LG HDR 4K:

 Resolution: 3840 x 2160 (2160p/4K UHD 1 - Ultra High Definition)

 UI Looks like: 1920 x 1080 @ 60.00Hz

 Main Display: Yes

 Mirror: Off

 Online: Yes

 Rotation: Supported

 Automatically Adjust Brightness: Yes

Color LCD:

 Display Type: Built-in Liquid Retina XDR Display

 Resolution: 3456 x 2234 Retina

 Mirror: Off

 Online: Yes

 Automatically Adjust Brightness: No

 Connection Type: Internal

LG HDR 4K:

 Resolution: 3840 x 2160 (2160p/4K UHD 1 - Ultra High Definition)

 UI Looks like: 1920 x 1080 @ 60.00Hz

 Mirror: Off

 Online: Yes

 Rotation: Supported

 Automatically Adjust Brightness: Yes

Same. When my M1 Macbook Pro wakes from screen lock, the windows will have switched displays. My window grouping setting is turned off, and it will happen for apps that only have 1 window open, anyway. It is super annoying.

So I just installed Magnet from the App Store and that "seems" to have taken care of the problem. The only app that still seems to get lost when I wake the laptop is Music which always wants to go back to the main screen.

I've been using Magnet before and after experiencing this change in behavior and it has not solved anything for me.

Are you keeping all windows from open apps on the same screen - or trying to keep multiple windows from the same app (e.g. Safari) on different screens? I had multiple app windows carefully set up to be in different workspaces depending on task. After sleep, they regrouped from second screen to laptop and mixed everything up. Since turning off sleep, they have been mostly well-behaved, but this is not a long-term solution.

I generally have different apps on different screens.

Thinking about it now, the other change I made was I installed DisplayLink manager to get my new Pluggable hub to work with 3 monitors so I'm running 1 TB4 to the hub and then 3 HDMI out. Before I had all three monitors plugged directly into the laptop. It was about the same time as I installed Magnet so could be a variable as well.

i have not tried the magnet solution because i'm a cheapskate and refuse to pay $8 for something that should just work. but i have had really good luck with the finder->hide others solution posted here. it is sometimes a pain, but it does work 99% of the time.

Just adding another user with this issue. Brand new 16" MacBook Pro M1Max with 2 external thunderbolt to Display Port connections. As others had noted, this issue seems to happen because the displays wake after the Mac. If I turn on the displays before waking the Mac, I don't have this issue, but this is hardly an acceptable solution. Forgetting to do this and you're spending a minute+ re-organizing your windows. Especially annoying in an application like Adobe Illustrator with a myriad of tool windows that get scattered to the wind. I've submitted a formal bug report. Let's hope this gets a fix soon! Such an annoyance for such an expensive machine.