Desktop icons inappropriately snap to grid after update to macOS Tahoe.

I had the same problem. For me, the fix was to do this:

1. Go to System Settings > Desktop & Dock > Widgets.
2. I toggled the setting to show widgets on the desktop and in stage manager.
3. I closed out of all the widgets that appeared on my screen.
4. I confirmed that icons do not randomly bounce around when dragged and dropped across the desktop.
5. I disabled the setting to show widgets on the desktop and in stage manager.
6. I re-tested and confirmed that the desktop icons still behave normally.

So, it seems a quick toggle of this setting on and off does the trick. At least, it did for me on my MacBook Pro M3 Pro. YMMV. Hopefully, this is fixed properly in macOS 26.1. It was not fixed in the recent 26.0.1 update.

Rich

Richard Bottiglieri wrote:

1. I had the same problem. For me, the fix was to do this:

Go to System Settings > Desktop & Dock > Widgets.

2. I toggled the setting to show widgets on the desktop and in stage manager.

3. I closed out of all the widgets that appeared on my screen.

4. I confirmed that icons do not randomly bounce around when dragged and dropped across the desktop.

5. I disabled the setting to show widgets on the desktop and in stage manager.

6. I re-tested and confirmed that the desktop icons still behave normally.

So, it seems a quick toggle of this setting on and off does the trick. At least, it did for me on my MacBook Pro M3 Pro. YMMV. Hopefully, this is fixed properly in macOS 26.1. It was not fixed in the recent 26.0.1 update.

Rich

Good computing Richard Bottiglieri ! Appreciate your post

That's what is correcting things. Checked the widgets on desktop again and manually removed the widgets. After that I could move the folders or documents to the upper left corner of my desktop.

Anthony M Kassir MD wrote:

After updating to macOS Tahoe, all of the icons on my Desktop are behaving as if "snap to grid" is turned on but it is off. I normally have all my icons in certain locations on the Desktop, and don't use the grid. Now if I move one to the desired location, it moves automatically to a nearby unwanted location.

Under View options, "Stack by..." and "Sort by..." are set to None. Stacks are off.

I looked in other threads and learned how to reveal invisible items but there are no .DS_store files in my Desktop folder to delete.

I've played with the grid and icon sizes under view options to no avail. I've turned Stacks on and off. I've chosen other Sort by options and then switched back to None. Nothing worked.

I've tried restarting, and restarting in Safe Boot mode.

Any help would be most appreciated!

MacBook Pro November 2023 16" M3 Max

macOS Tahoe

hmmm... very interesting.

Seems you have done all the right things in an effort to sort the glitch.

Turn off all these other features to get back to terra firma in an effort to effect a change:

Then try relaunching the Finder on the fly and compare your results:

Anthony M Kassir MD wrote:

Leroy, thank you for your reply. I followed your instructions but the problem persists. Any other ideas?

Besides View Option in the Finder>View> View Option dropdown

Control click on the Desktop and make some changes as well(?)

you can try from Terminal.app copy & paste:

defaults write com.apple.finder CreateDesktop true; killall Finder

compare your results and report back.

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Same here, but I found a workaround for my needs, as I dont have milion folders on desktop, just couple of them that are constantly used.

1. turn ON snap to grid - let folders be organized nicely, one folder under another
2. turn OFF snap to grid - select all folders you need, and move them to left side

it's ok for my needs, but I agree it's iritating and worked before, now it's a bug to fix, hopefully they'll solve it in next update.

I also dont like bigger corner roundings of apps, it made me modify my wallpaper in order to match the size of those roundings.

What a hot mess. None of this is working. (Widgets on or off, doesn't matter.) I also had the bonus of a tiny calendar on the screen that wouldn't go away (widget-didn't know because I've never bothered with them) that when moved around gave me the added bonus blowing all my icons all over **** and back. Then of course the coup de grace was the snap to grid crap. So now I've wasted two work hours trying to remove a calendar (figured it out, thanks) plus trying to put my desktop back in order, just to find out Apple meant to do that. For the record: don't use calendar, don't use widgets, don't use snap to grid. All the bells and whistles of Tahoe look like nothing but a pain in the keister to me.

OMG I am so sorry I installed Tahoe. Never doing that again. Where do I go to get my time back?

Hello, I've tried all of the above and none of it worked.

I'm concerned because file access will be next to impossible unless this can be fixed.

I'm not interested in widgets or stacks, & if I drag a folder or a file to a location, that is where I want them to be.

I generally keep a fair number of files on the desktop...now they are all on top of each other, & if I try to organise them as I wish, they just fly all over the place..

It isn't something I can work with.

Effectively, suddenly the machine doesn't work.

I also have kind of same problem: when I have turned of widgets on desktop I can't move folders or documents to that place (in the upper left corner of my desktop)

Still have problem as well I cannot move folders on the desktop with or without widgets

and HD icon is invisible.