Ventura Missing Dock icons ... How do I restore them?

I found a solution. The problem does not lie on the alias but the folder icon. You need to replace the icon of the original folder, then create an alias and drag it into the dock. after that it works as previously to open the folder up right away.

How i solved the download icon bug: Very weird, but i just copied the original icon from the original download folder and pasted it back again (but with a step in between, so the metadata is not the same):

• open folder info panel: CMD + I
• select folder icon on top left so it is outlined
• CMD + C
• open photoshop, create new file (right dimensions are pre-selected), paste with CMD + V, select all with CMD + A, copy again with CMD + C [alternatively, you can download an icon somewhere from the internet like macosicons.com and drag it right into the info panel icon]
• go back to folder info, select icon again so you see the outline again and paste with CMD + V
• done, now create alias and drag into dock.

I know that not everybody has Photoshop, but that's what worked for me. I tried with preview as well, but it seems it does not recognise the image data.

I'm happy that it is solved and i could help you.

Thanks to @Barney-15E for the solution above around symbolic links. This works very well and a great alternative to the other solution noted that uses Photoshop and swapping icons, etc.

For others' reference, here's the command I used to create the symbolic link to Downloads, which I stored in a subfolder called "Aliases" in my user directory:

ln -s ~/Downloads /Users/MYNAME/Aliases/Downloads

I just opened Terminal, pasted this command, and once the link was created, I dragged it directly to the dock and all worked great.

Create a symbolic link instead of an alias.

ln -s ~/Downloads ~/My\ Folder\ Aliases/Downloads

Change the "My Folder Aliases" to the path where you store your aliases. Make sure to escape the spaces with \

Or, just hold down cmd+Opt when you click on a regular folder in the Dock.

This worked a treat - although, you don't need photoshop.

1. Create a new folder and copy the downloads icon to the new folder to store it
2. Create another new folder and copy the blank folder to the downloads folder (replace original downloads icon)
3. Make alias of the downloads folder and move that to the dock (should copy with blank folder icon)
4. If that works, remove it from dock, copy the downloads icon back to the downloads folder and make alias again. It should now all work accordingly.

Thank you very much, Martensn. Could not have done it without you.

Follow on

Terminal command below

killall Dock

You can reset the the dock to the original layout with this terminal command:

delete com.apple.dock; killall Dock

Hope it helps someone.

I'm experiencing the very same (and annoying!) issue :-

As per OP I have always had a "Downloads" Shortcut on the dock - it allows direct link to the Downloads folder and no silly fan etc has the usual Blue folder icon (as expected) however now its a "Generic white Page" icon which i do not expect

Method = Create Alias of "Downloads" Folder > Move Alias to "Documents" Folder > Rename Alias to "Downloads" > Drag and drop to Dock, next to Trash > Clicking it opens "Downloads" folder directly (as a shortcut should do!!)

Issue Started :-

1. I Updated to Ventura
2. Blue Folder shortcut has now become White page icon (but still works as expected)
3. I have tried deleting dock.plist as some posts suggested - not effect other than resetting my entire dock :(

I expect this :-

But i am getting this now :-

This "Grid" option as a shortcut is useless :-

I don't have photoshop, but I used your excellent directions above and copied and pasted the old icon into Notes, then pulled it into Mac Photos. I then exported as a jpeg to the desktop and dragged it into the info pane.

Folbo wrote:

Thanks for this ... I am not sure how it helps ... dragging the local downloads from the finder sidebar simply adds the awful fan mechanism back again.

Interestingly dragging there iCloud shortcuts from the finder sidebar does nothing ... literally ... the dock makes a space then closes the space! It is almost as if something in the OS is designed not to allow access to iCloud!!! It does the same if I drag the alias from Finder showing iCloud, and also when I drag it from the finder showing the local iCloud files (/Library/Mobile Documents/com~apple~CloudDocs/)

I tried to use the Terminal command ... cmd-space term to find ... but Ventura has also broken spotlight (again). Why do these new macOS versions not respect a user's settings? cmd-Space Term produces all sorts of irrelevant crud. I wish macOS just worked!

I will find terminal in the apps in a while but a restart of the dock process will probably not do much more than a restart of the entire machine ... which I do daily since I am spending more production time in bootcamp than ever.

Q - " dragging the local downloads from the finder sidebar simply adds the awful fan mechanism back again. "

A - On the " Download folder" in the Dock >> Right Click it.

A - A Sub Menu should be presented as in image below. Then choose the type of setting that works best for your needs

lol at least it works. you might prefer PNGs, as they support transparency. JPG does not.

i also experience this does not work for some more important folder. for example, i can't make it work for the applications folder.

Fantastic.

I created a folder called 'Alias' and moved my alias folders in there where I could rename them without having the term alias in the description. Makes it a little cleaner.

Glad it worked for you

My Dock looks like 1st image below and the Downloads Folder is a alias to the Folder in Finder 2nd image below

I tried with PNG, and it didn't work for me; that's why I exported JPEG. But I'm technically incompetent, so it might have been something else hahaha.

it works!