Pages, keynote and Numbers documents in shared icloud folder take too long to open

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Level 1

5 points

Pages, keynote and Numbers documents in shared icloud folder take too long to open

Pages, Keynote, and Numbers files in a shared icloud folder are taking 20 to 40 seconds to open. Preview, MS Word, MS PowerPoint, MS Excel files in the same shared folder open instantly. If I turn off my wifi while it is opening, it will often solve the problem.

My internet is fast and I am not running a VPN, antivirus or cleaner program. This has been going on for a long time (multiple reboots for other reasons).

I tried apple support. They had me forget my wifi network and reconnect. This fixed the problem for files I had just opened before but not for files I hadn't touched in a while.

If this were just an issue of shared folder files taking longer, wouldn't it be the same for Preview and MS files? Any help would be appreciated.

System information:

iMac M3 with 304 GB empty storage
Sequoia 15.7.1
Pages/Numbers/Keynote 14.4
Wifi 200-300 MBps
iCloud 1TB of unused storage

Posted on Dec 1, 2025 4:23 AM

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Answer 1

Dec 2, 2025 9:50 AM in response to Scasey67

I don't do this, so I'm just wondering-- what happens if you double click on the document rather than opening from the app? Or vice-versa if that's what you already do.

What happens if you right-click on the document and choose "Download Now?"

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Answer 2

Dec 2, 2025 11:32 AM in response to Scasey67

I have a Numbers file from a while back that's in my iCloud Drive. I set it to "Remove Download" so that it was not locally on my Mac. I waited maybe 15 minutes, and then I double clicked on it, and it opened in less than 3 seconds.

Try restarting in Safe mode to see if anything changes. This bypasses certain potentially disruptive processes, and it often helps. Safe Mode is different for different computers, so see this:

Start up your Mac in safe mode - Apple Support

You could upgrade to Tahoe. I finally did that over the weekend and all is fine.

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Answer 3

Scasey67 Author

Level 1

5 points

Dec 2, 2025 10:19 AM in response to Richard.Taylor

Thank you for the response.

Double clicking is just as slow as opening from the app. Downloading from iCloud first appears to be slightly faster but not an instant open like I get for Preview, MS Word, and other apps.

It sounds like it's a problem with downloading from iCloud, but I don't understand why I don't have the same issue with other apps, or why it is an instant open when I turn off my wifi.

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Answer 4

Scasey67 Author

Level 1

5 points

Dec 2, 2025 12:33 PM in response to Richard.Taylor

I will try that. I have been avoiding Tahoe so far because so many people seem to hate it but it's probably time to bite that bullet. Thanks!

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