macOS 15.4 causes nightly kernel panic (WindowServer freeze, M4 Pro)

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Level 1

40 points

macOS 15.4 causes nightly kernel panic (WindowServer freeze, M4 Pro)

Device: MacBook Pro M4 Pro

macOS Version: Sequoia 15.4 (clean install, build 24E248)

Previous Versions: 15.2 and 15.3 were 100% stable with no issues.

Issue: After updating to macOS 15.4, my MacBook Pro began rebooting unexpectedly during the night while the lid is closed and the machine is idle. This issue did not occur on previous versions (15.2 or 15.3) and only started after the 15.4 update.

System Setup: The system is almost fresh, with no third-party software installed beyond defaults. Only wired headphones are connected.

Important Notes:

No third-party kernel extensions installed
No external monitors, hubs, or docks
Power Nap enabled (default)
Clean install of 15.4 (not an upgrade in place)
Never had crashes or instability on 15.2 or 15.3

Crash Details:

An example crash occurred at ~03:23 AM on March 31, 2025. The panic log indicates an AOP (Always-On Processor) data abort: panic(cpu 10 caller 0xfffffe003791aef8): AOP DATA ABORT pc=0x0000000001091a00 Exception class=0x25 (Data Abort taken without a change in Exception level), IL=1, iss=0x6 far=0x0000000000000005

The log also references kernel extensions com.apple.driver.IOSlaveProcessor and com.apple.driver.RTBuddy, which seem related to the AOP handling low-level tasks like power management or audio processing. The crash appears to occur during a sleep/wake transition, as the log shows a sleep event at 0x67f2f282 and a wake event at 0x67f2f6a5, with the panic happening shortly after waking.

This issue might be related to the Always-On Processor failing during idle/sleep states, possibly tied to power management, audio, or sensor handling. It does not seem to involve the graphics subsystem (e.g., WindowServer or AGXMetal), as I initially suspected.

Request:

Can anyone advise if there’s a known workaround for this AOP-related crash? Is this a regression introduced in macOS 15.4? I’ve attached the full panic log below for reference.

Panic Log:

Panic log

MacBook Pro 16″, macOS 15.4

Posted on Apr 7, 2025 12:04 AM

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Answer 1

Top-ranking reply

Kossil Author

Level 1

40 points

Apr 14, 2025 5:52 AM in response to Kossil

Update: I’ve identified the likely cause of the kernel panics — Microsoft Edge browser.

Here’s what happened:

After using Firefox for a week (with no issues), I launched Microsoft Edge, worked in it for a bit, then closed the lid as usual. When I woke the Mac shortly afterward, the system froze and restarted with the same panic AOP DATA ABORT error as before.

This didn’t happen with Firefox or Safari, only Edge.

It seems Edge may be triggering some background activity that conflicts with the Always-On Processor during sleep/wake cycles — possibly related to background networking or wake triggers.

As a precaution, I’ve now completely removed Edge from the system. Since then, I haven’t seen any panics.

So for anyone experiencing similar sleep-related panics on macOS 15.4, try avoiding Microsoft Edge or removing it entirely. Disabling “Wake for network access” also seems to help reduce the risk.

UPD: Interestingly, I found a similar report on the Microsoft Edge forum describing the same problem on macOS 15.4:

Microsoft Edge causing Kernel panics in MacBook Pro M1 Max running macOS Sequoia Version 15.4 (24E248)

So if anyone is seeing random panics on Sequoia 15.4, especially after sleep — check if Edge is involved.

Hope this helps others save hours of debugging.

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Answer 2

w3b54g3

Level 1

48 points

May 1, 2025 3:29 PM in response to Kossil

OK, Regardless of the root cause, I may have stumbled on a, hopefully, temporary fix until Apple fixes this:

The kernel panic seems to be related to laptop power nap. More specifically to the Hibernation. There are three settings on MacOS for Hibernation: Save the c current state to disk, to memory or mixed.

The default Hibernation setting for a laptop is mixed — let Mac decide. So I tried to save the state to RAM and the kernel panic continued, but when I set it to disk only, the kernel went away!!!

To display your current setting, enter (in terminal)

pmset -g | grep hibernatemode

To change Hibernatemode to disk:

sudo pmset -c hibernatemode 25

This is slower than waking off RAM, but no unwanted restarts.

Possible settings are:

Hibernatemode 0 is pure sleep. (Save to RAM)

Hibernatemode 25 is pure hibernation (Save to Disk)

Hibernatemode 3 is both sleep and hibernation

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Answer 3

w3b54g3

Level 1

48 points

May 7, 2025 7:23 AM in response to Kossil

I heard the advice to unplug all peripherals, yet I left my ubiquitous aftermarket wired headphones.

Unplugging the headphones did the trick. Have not had a kernel panic for a week.

My guess is that it is the MacBook Apple Silicone redesigned high-impedance headphones' jack that is causing the crashes.

I am keeping my hibernatemode to RAM only as my MBA is mostly plugged into power.

sudo pmset -c hibernatemode 0

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Answer 4

May 7, 2025 1:51 AM in response to Kossil

The same thing is happening to me and my report looks very similar to yours. I thought it may have something to do with my recent install of Aldente but I think I have it figured out.

When I leave my Audio Technica ATH-M50, which are only monitoring and not high end headphones plugged in and close the laptop (putting it to sleep) I find the laptop has force restarted while in sleep as my charger light is turned off through Aldente but turns back on when the laptop force restarts.

Tried using my MacBook Pro M4 without leaving the headphones plugged in and I have not had a kernel panic in days.

YMMV but that's what did it for me.

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Answer 5

Kossil Author

Level 1

40 points

Apr 13, 2025 8:03 AM in response to steve626

Thanks for the reply!

Just to clarify what I meant by a “clean install”:

Initially, I updated in place from macOS 15.3 to 15.4. After that update, I started seeing consistent kernel panics during sleep/wake cycles, typically overnight while the MacBook was closed and idle. This had never happened before on 15.2 or 15.3, which were both rock-solid for me.

The panics worried me—at first I suspected a potential hardware issue—so I decided to do a full clean install of macOS 15.4. That means I completely erased the internal disk (APFS container) using Disk Utility in Recovery Mode, and then freshly installed 15.4 via macOS recovery, without restoring any Time Machine backup or migrating user data. Only the default apps are installed; no kernel extensions, no launch agents, and only wired headphones connected.

However, after the first boot and setup, I put the Mac to sleep and the exact same panic happened again right after waking. The panic log once again referenced AOP DATA ABORT and the same Apple internal kexts: IOSlaveProcessor and RTBuddy.

As a temporary workaround, I disabled the option “Wake for network access”, which is found in System Settings > Energy Saver. Since disabling that, the panics during sleep have stopped—at least for now.

It’s unclear whether that alone fixed it, or if the combination of the clean install + turning off network wake helped.

This option allows the Mac to periodically wake in sleep mode to fetch iMessages or iCloud data. I suspect something about that low-power wake transition is interacting badly with the Always-On Processor in this version.

Hopefully that helps clarify what I meant by “clean install” and gives some insight into what I’ve tried so far.

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Answer 6

Apr 22, 2025 2:56 AM in response to jordanthomas

Do you have a headset plugged in? For my case, when I plugged in the headset into the mac during the sleep, the system randomly crashed and rebooted. I upgraded to 15.4.1 and switched to use a Bluetooth headset, then the problem is gone. I have used the system for about one week since the last upgrade, and no crashes anymore.

I hope that this will give you some clues.

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Answer 7

Kossil Author

Level 1

40 points

May 18, 2025 11:32 PM in response to Kossil

Update – macOS Sequoia 15.5

After installing the 15.5 update, I can confirm that the nightly kernel panic (AOP data abort) during sleep appears to be resolved — so far, no unexpected reboots or panics have occurred with the lid closed overnight. That’s definitely a big improvement. However, a new (and strange) issue has popped up:

I’m now seeing a problem with wired headphones (Fiio FT1) connected to the 3.5mm audio jack. When the Mac goes to sleep with the lid closed, the headphones seem to "disappear" as an audio device. In the morning, macOS no longer recognizes them — they don’t show up in the Sound settings , and unplugging/replugging does nothing. Audio only plays through the built-in speakers. The only thing that fixes it is a full reboot. Then the headphones work again... until the next sleep cycle.

So while the kernel panic is gone (yay!), there seems to be some regression affecting the analog audio path during sleep/wake transitions. Possibly another AOP-related quirk?

Anyone else seeing this?

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Answer 8

steve626

Level 6

13,791 points

Apr 12, 2025 6:24 PM in response to jasonyangshadow

jasonyangshadow wrote:

... and hard-resintallation (erase the entire disk and resintallation), both are not working in my case.

For the "hard reinstallation," did you migrate back your user information and reattach external devices? If so, doing that might have brought back whatever is causing the problems. A better test is erase entire disk and create one generic admin user (maybe call it "admin") but no other users yet and nothing installed and nothing connected ... does the problem still exist? If so it is hardware, the Mac needs repair. If not, something installed or connected is causing it.

Macbook Pro M4 - Kernel panic after upgra… - Apple Community

Someone mentioned in this thread, this thread reports the exactly same issue as in this thread. It might be related to some audio devices, I am trying to unplug my headphone during the mac sleep and replace my wired headphone with a bluethooth one. Not sure if this will sovle this issue temporally.

I think unplugging the headphones is a good test.

One thing confimred is that this bug is introduced by 15.4 update Should not be related to the hardware issue.

Sometimes external devices use drivers or software that are incompatible with the OS. The problems sometimes don't become apparent until an upgrade or update to the OS. Or the external device hardware may have a faulty interface with the Mac and it works up to a point, until a MacOS update occurs.

It could also, of course, be a bug in MacOS. But the first thing is to ascertain if a plain vanilla Mac with nothing connected still has those panics. If so it is most likely faulty hardware in the Mac.

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Answer 9

Apr 27, 2025 6:04 AM in response to Kossil

After upgrading to 15.4.1, I'm having the same issue on M4. The common thing I see from all the posts on here is wired headphones.

First time it crashed while the laptop was on sleepmode, and the second time when I plugged in my laptop to power socket (usb-c) while Garageband was open. In both cases, I had my wired headphones plugged in.

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Answer 10

den.thed

Level 10

90,934 points

Apr 13, 2025 8:41 AM in response to Kossil

Full computer sleep mode has been a problem with desktop systems for some time now.

Sorry the following screenshots are for desktop Mac's, but the general idea is the same.

As a test:

Turn On "Prevent automatic sleeping when display is off"

Set "Turn display off when inactive" to 5 or 10 minutes

Leave the Mac On and only allow the display(s) to turn Off

Do not manually Sleep from the Apple Drop Down menu

Shut Down the Mac when away for a day or more

It may get fixed, if enough folks send Feedback.

Feedback - MacBook Pro - Apple

Feedback - macOS - Apple

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Answer 11

May 15, 2025 5:50 AM in response to zxchhh

Not the case for me, I’ve run Aldente as per normal for just over a week and made sure to unplug the headphones and I have not had a kernel panic besides once when I forgot to unplug them after closing the lid. Prior to making sure I didn’t leave the headphones plugged in I experienced kernel panic multiple times per day.

Which type of headphones? I have some cheaper in ear earphones I’m going to test and see if it causes the same issue.

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Answer 12

Apr 13, 2025 5:29 PM in response to Kossil

same on M3 mac MBP , never got any issue and just after installing 15.4 Kernel panic... now i'm in safe mode and not a single Kernel Panic since.. i'm waiting for a fix from apple , and yes it also happened when the mac was sleeping.

Last time i let auto install on a mac ... if this would happen on windows there would be a massive coverage but it's on mac so no one cares and apple support tels me it's my machine which is faulty despite hardware test saying everything is ok ...

Apple customer service is not what it used to be ... seriously...

Kernel Panic Log

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Answer 13

steve626

Level 6

13,791 points

Apr 12, 2025 10:41 AM in response to Kossil

Kossil wrote:

• Device: MacBook Pro M4 Pro

macOS Version: Sequoia 15.4 (clean install, build 24E248)

Previous Versions: 15.2 and 15.3 were 100% stable with no issues.

This issue did not occur on previous versions (15.2 or 15.3) and only started after the 15.4 update.

System Setup: The system is almost fresh, with no third-party software installed beyond defaults. Only wired headphones are connected.

What do you mean by "clean install"? You indicate that you applied a 15.4 update.

Disconnect the headphones and anything that is connected to see if the panics stop.

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Answer 14

Apr 12, 2025 4:51 PM in response to steve626

For my case, I followed the suggestion of apple advisors (apple support), they asked me to do soft-resintallation (keeping user data) and hard-resintallation (erase the entire disk and resintallation), both are not working in my case.

Macbook Pro M4 - Kernel panic after upgra… - Apple Community

Someone mentioned in this thread, this thread reports the exactly same issue as in this thread. It might be related to some audio devices, I am trying to unplug my headphone during the mac sleep and replace my wired headphone with a bluethooth one. Not sure if this will sovle this issue temporally.

One thing confimred is that this bug is introduced by 15.4 update Should not be related to the hardware issue.

Reply

Answer 15

Apr 8, 2025 1:46 PM in response to Kossil

exactly the same issue I had on my MacBook Pro m4 after upgrading to 15.4

It randomly appears. I tried reinstalling macOS, but my Mac still randomly has this issue. Also, it is definitely caused by 15.4, this issue does not happen in earlier versions.

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