Spellcheck not working in Monterey 12.1

This is the right answer. Grammarly was the problem. Uninstalling doesn't fix it. You need to re-enable spellchecking system wide with

defaults write -g NSAllowContinuousSpellChecking -bool true

Huge thanks to christos196 and Leeabe51

Did you have any grammar of similar apps installed?

Try booting to Safe Mode. That boot up takes minutes and clears caches and other things that may resolve your problem.

How to use safe mode on your Mac - Apple Support

A lot of times just boot to Safe Mode followed by normal boot resolves problems.

Since the issue is presented while booting into Safe Mode - this appears to be System Wide issue. That os something specific to the user Admin Account.

Suggestion to further trouble shoot the issue Set up users, guests, and groups on Mac. Then log out of Admin Account and into the newly created account and Test if the issue is presented.

Should the issue still be there in the test account - it would be reasonable to conclude the problem is truly System Wide.

Any Third Party Applications that will interfere with the normal operation of the OS, alter, modify, remove or delete or attempt to do so is an invitation for disaster and may require a Reinstallation of the OS.

One may need to consider a Reinstallation via Recovery Mode. This should only reinstall any corrupted or missing elements of the OS without touching any Preferences, Setting, Applications and Personal Files.

It is further suggested to perform a Time Machine Backup before attempting the above suggestion..

I am having the same exact issue as you are @mlondon. Grammerly seems to be the culprit.

Unfortunately I gave up trying to find a solution.

I erased the disk and reinstalled macOS for clean start. Thankful for iCloud Drive, all files were back overnight.

Hang on! I just checked 12.2 is available now. I would update later tonight.

System Preferences >> Keyboard >> Check " Correct spelling automatically "

Cocktail - is it really required to use it ? Unless one is very very careful - it could be root cause of the above mentioned issue.

Any Third Party Applications that will interfere with the normal operation of the OS, alter, modify, remove or delete or attempt to do so is an invitation for disaster and may require a Reinstallation of the OS.

I had the same problem. (Macbook Air M1, Monterey 12.2.1)

The spellcheck was not working after I uninstalled Grammarly.

That solved the problem for me https://mjtsai.com/blog/2021/12/22/grammarly-disables-spell-checking-globally/

I also have the exact same issue. I had grammerly on Big Sur too and never faced any problems. But with Monterey 12.1 spell check seems to go for a toss. Actively awating an OS upgrade from Apple.

I am just waiting for the new update to come through. I had even approached Apple support for it and they didn't seem to have any idea also.

It worked. Thanks man!

👍