Over the last 10 days, my MacBook Air M2 has had heating issues during normal day-to-day work. No extra work or heavy usage, and when he heats the battery, it drains(5 hours) much faster than usual.
I have the same when I have a Pages document open AND that document is stored on iCloud.
The processes Pages and corespotlightd both use about 40% cpu all the time even when I am not editing.
If you take the document off iCloud then the problem goes away.
I have the same when I have a Pages document open AND that document is stored on iCloud.
The processes Pages and corespotlightd both use about 40% cpu all the time even when I am not editing.
If you take the document off iCloud then the problem goes away.
Sounds like you likely have some software that is working hard in the background. Software using lots of resources will both make the laptop run hot and the battery drain more quickly.
Run the third party app EtreCheck and post the complete report here so we can examine it for clues.
How to use the Add Text Feature When Posting an EtreCheck Report - Apple Community
Below is a snippet from the Etrecheck report that are found to most interesting
Any of which, on a individual bases, or combined together would account for the computer be Throttled due to excessive Heat and or excessively pushed to its limits
Shall step away and leave room for my colleague to do the heavy lifting
Kernel panics - This system has experienced kernel panics. This could be a sign of hardware failure.
No Time Machine backup - Time Machine backup not found.
Runaway user process - A user process is using a large percentage of your CPU.
disk0 - APPLE SSD AP0256Z 251.00 GB (Solid State - TRIM: Yes)
Size: 245.11 GB, Free: 83.05 GB, Available: 104.40 GB
Remote Apple Events: Enabled
Remote Management: Enabled
Screen sharing: Enabled
Remote login: Enabled
Unsigned Files:
Running app: /private/var/folders/tw/77gz_n2j38dblm7rrgythb3m0000gn/T/AppTranslocation/60591E33-2823-4E22-982E-9E30EF010194/d/EtreCheckPro-2.app/Contents/MacOS/EtreCheckPro
/Library/Application Support/Google/GoogleUpdater/Current/GoogleUpdater.app/Contents/MacOS/GoogleUpdater --wake-all --enable-logging --vmodule=*/components/update_client/*=2,*/chrome/enterprise_companion/*=2,*/chrome/updater/*=2 --system
com.google.keystone.daemon.plist (Not signed - installed 2025-11-10)
VPNs:
tunnel-nssr - /Applications/Turbo VPN.app
tunnel-ssr - /Applications/Turbo VPN.app
tunnel-xray - /Applications/Turbo VPN.app
tunnel - /Applications/Turbo VPN.app
Top Processes Snapshot by Memory:
Process (count) RAM usage (Source - Location)
Google Chrome Helper (Renderer) (8) 1.13 GB (Google LLC)
2026-04-16 Command Line Tools for Xcode 26.4 (26.4) - Software update
2026-04-17 Command Line Tools for Xcode 26.4 (26.4.1) - Software update
2026-05-18 Command Line Tools for Xcode 26.5 (26.5) - Software update
And a whole series of Craches
The MacBook Air (M2, 2022) was first introduced in 2022 making the battery 4 years old
Apple Batteries are rated for 1000 Full Battery Cycles or 80% of the Amperage Capacity before it needs servicing or replacement
The biggest enemy of batteries are prolonged periods of excessive Heat or Cold ( refer to "environmental conditions " ) later in this reply
The Apple MacBook Air (M2, 2022) uses passive cooling, meaning it has no internal fan ( making it a fan-less computer).
It dissipates heat through a combination of the chip’s efficiency, a heat spreader, the aluminum chassis, and thermal throttling when needed.
The Apple Inc. M2 chip is built on an efficient ARM-based architecture with high performance-per-watt. Compared with traditional x86 laptop CPUs, it generates less heat for the same workload.
That efficiency is the main reason passive cooling is practical.
Inside the laptop, the M2 SoC (system on a chip) is connected to a metal heat spreader, a graphite pads/sheets,and thermal interface materials.
These components spread heat away from the tiny chip across a larger surface area so heat does not concentrate in one hotspot.
The MacBook Air’s aluminum chassis absorbs and radiates heat into the surrounding air.
Without a fan, the laptop relies on normal airflow around the device:
This is much quieter than active cooling because there are no moving parts.
The computer is rated to perform under the follow environmental conditions
Running the computer or storing the computer for prolonged periods of time outside the above created norms.
Can or will have a negative effect on the battery run-time. Quote " it drains(5 hours) much faster than usual. "
etrecheck report of MacBook m2
Lord Sumptuous wrote:
I have the same when I have a Pages document open AND that document is stored on iCloud.
The processes Pages and corespotlightd both use about 40% cpu all the time even when I am not editing.
If you take the document off iCloud then the problem goes away.
Intersting
Pages 15.2.1 as part of Creative Studio
Using a M4 Mac Mini with Tahoe 26.5
All my Pages, Keynote and Numbers are synced to and from iCloud
So do you think 15.2.1 fixes the strangely high CPU activity?
MacBook Air M2 has heating issues during normal use
