Mail crashing after installing macOS Ventura (clean install)

I have had issues with Mail crashing after updating my MacBook M1 Pro to 13.2. Certain emails were causing Mail to crash. I've done a clean install of 13.1 and Mail is working great. Here's another discussion that you might be interested in - https://discussions.apple.com/thread/254606876?answerId=258612907022&cid=em-com-apple_email_question_helpfulanswer-go_to_the_discussion-en-us-11192020#258612907022

I don't see any of the usual suspects in the report. But you've not rebooted for 2 days. It's wise to restart frequently as that will clear out temporary system and application cache and swap files. It will help performance. To start try booting into Safe Mode according to How to use safe mode on your Mac and test to see if the problem persists. Reboot normally and test again.

NOTE 1: Safe Mode boot can take up to 3 - 5 minutes as it's doing the following; 

• Verifies your startup disk and attempts to repair directory issues, if needed

• Loads only required kernel extensions (prevents 3rd party kernel/extensions from loading)

• Prevents Startup Items and Login Items from opening automatically

• Disables user-installed fonts 

• Deletes font caches, kernel cache, and other system cache files

NOTE 2: if you have a wireless keyboard with rechargeable batteries connect it with its charging cable before booting into Safe Mode. This makes it act as a wired keyboard as will insure a successful boot into Safe Mode.

With a fresh system and no user files it's beginning to sound more like some sort of hardware issue. The next step would be to take it into the nearest  Apple Genius Bar or Apple Authorized Service Provider for free diagnostic tests.  Preferably a Genius Bar.

Your Mac is trying to display, or see if it needs to display, this “unsubscribe” header: Unsubscribe from mailing lists in Mail on Mac - Apple Support

However, as part of that, it looks at the DKIM message header. One of your email messages has a corrupt header and that is crashing Mail. Considering how often you get this crash, it must be a message that you get pretty often. If you can track down exactly which messages cause this, then you may be able to unsubscribe.

MobileMeKevin,

Can see that you're working hard on this and that you really want to find out why.

My suggestions - in addition to those of Old Toad - are:

1. re-install Ventura (13.2 was made available this week) using Recovery
2. create a new user account
3. in Safe Mode open Mail in that (new) user account; with no mail accounts like Outlook, Gmail or the like, no Bundles, and no 'Hide my email' etc

If Mail still crashes, then you may be one step closer to identifying Mail and/or the particular installation of macOS. Even then, there may be some other piece of software which is in some way responsible.

The Apple crashlogs (from /Applications/Utilities/Console) ought also to help in at least diagnosing what's provoking the crash.

I know that's a lot of work; but in the end you might save yourself more frustration.

Finger's crossed… :-)

We feel your pain, MobileMeKevin!

The advice to use 'Verified only Apple Software installed no third party apps' is particularly hard to follow, isn't it; although one sees why Apple advises it.

Also appreciate that you've probably done more testing than most of us would have the patience - not to mention the time - to do!

Would you agree that such a phenomenon is really very unlikely to be one that persists fresh from a factory image - of any version of macOS, including Ventura? Simply because so many people are not experiencing an immediate crash.

It must be something else.

I know it's tiresome, but if you can:

• make a working backup (I'm using the word 'working' advisedly!) of what's on your machine now
• bring your machine back to its factory state with - as has been asked - literally only the software installed by Apple
• not connect to the Internet by wifi or cable
• launch Mail with no accounts enabled, no bundles, no extensions, no mailboxes, no data at all.

Does it still crash?

That ought to prove something. Then presumably try:

1. connecting to the Internet
2. adding just one account
3. slowly adding in third party apps

Is there a point at which something in the environment is sufficiently different - even in unexpected ways - for the crash to be reproducible? A particular message or structure somewhere in Mail's indexes etc. Assuming a factory image doesn't provoke the crash…

I know this is tedious; just trying to suggest following standard troubleshooting steps.

Download and run Etrecheck.  Copy and paste the results into your reply. Etrecheck is a diagnostic tool that was developed by one of the most respected users here in the ASC and recommended by Apple Support  to provide a snapshot of the system and help identify the more obvious culprits that can adversely affect a Mac's performance.

Copy the report

and use the Additional Text button to paste the report in your reply.

Then we can evaluate the report to see if we can determine the cause of the problem.

When you say a clean install did you migrate your user data to the new installation with Migration Assistant?

Download and run Etrecheck.  Copy and paste the results into your reply. Etrecheck is a diagnostic tool that was developed by one of the most respected users here in the ASC and recommended by Apple Support  to provide a snapshot of the system and help identify the more obvious culprits that can adversely affect a Mac's performance.

Copy the report

and use the Additional Text button to paste the report in your reply.

Then we can evaluate the report to see if we can determine the cause of the problem.

Do you have more than ONE email account set up in mail? If you do, I suggest you remove all of them, then add only ONE. Test for a while to see if Mail crashes. Then add the others (if you have more) one by one, testing for a period of time before adding the next. As a process of elimination to see which account is causing it. Then if you determine which account it is, I suggest you use web access using a browser to that email account, to check the messages to see if any are flagged as problematic. Especially look for messages with very large attachments. If you need the attachment, you can download it and save or back it up. Then delete that message from within the browser session. Then add that account to Mail and see if it helped. Sounds like there could very well be a corrupted message or attachment that isn't all the easy to isolate.