Mail App Freezes/Hangs OS X 10.10.2

Open Terminal an type

defaults delete NSGlobalDomain NSTextShowsControlCharacters

Yepp . that's all

See https://github.com/mathiasbynens/dotfiles/issues/465

Oh, i'm sorry

Apparently the setting didn't exist on your system.

That means that your problem differs from mine.

Bye

My problem with Mail on Yosemite has been the same on three different Macs; new iMac with Retina display, new MacBook Pro with Retina display, and older iMac. Same issue. Half the time or more Mail freezes up upon launch, which required a Force Quit. Upon restarting, most of the time Mail would function OK, but occasionally hang again, always with the same error-- Application Not Responding. I've tried every fix on this thread and other website threads to get it fixed with nothing working.

Here's what I did to fix it.

I left the Mail Preferences window open to Accounts. That's it. Now, when I restart the Mac or it starts up automatically in the AM, Mail launches as per normal, but with the Preferences window open to Accounts. No problems since. None. Zero.

I have over a dozen email accounts, all IMAP, ranging from Apple's iCloud to Gmail to standard IMAP accounts, personal and business. Obviously, there's a bug somewhere. I came upon the fix by disabling all email accounts, re-enabling each, one-by-one, then doing a shutdown and startup. About five re-boots in I inadvertently left the Preferences window open to Accounts. No freeze on the next reboot. When I close Preferences, the freeze begins again.

It's a cheap fix but it took a long time to get to it.

I had the same problem ever since upgrading to 10.10.2, on 2 computers -- MacBook Pro and iMac (both relatively new). I'm now on 10.10.3 on both. I only have one account -- a work Exchange account -- defined in Mail (I use a separate app for Gmail). I would start using Mail and it would hang (sometimes it would be almost immediate; sometimes I'd have a few minutes or even hours to work before it crashed, but never more than that). I'd be in the middle of writing an e-mail -- hang (and I'd have to start over from the beginning). It was driving me crazy, since my only other option was to use Outlook, or Outlook (Windows) with Parallels. Neither of these options were desirable or practical for various reasons, so I just kept using Mail and restarting every time it crashed/hung (and sending the crash reports to Apple every single time!). I went so far as to reinstall OS X 10.10.3 from scratch (not an upgrade -- a fresh install of brand new OS X on a wiped hard drive), and setting up my Mail account before installing ANY other apps (to rule out clashes with other installed apps) and before signing in to iCloud, but the problem remained.

My mail is structured in such a way that I have MANY folders and sub-folders (I had well over a thousand, easily). That had never been a problem before -- not with GroupWise (way back when...), Outlook, or Mail until the 10.10.2 OS upgrade. But I thought that perhaps doing some folder organization might help, and indeed, I realised that I had many folders that I had used some time ago but didn't need any more, so I started regrouping and reorganizing them. It took some time, but I finally got it down to a much "flatter" folder structure (not more than 2 levels beneath the main "Folders" level) and far fewer folders altogether (down to "only" ~570).

I did that ~2 days ago, and haven't had a single crash yet, on either of my two computers... I leave my computer at work on overnight with all apps open (including Mail), and I don't recall the last time I arrived at work in the morning without finding the Mail app crashed -- but for the past 2 days, it's been working perfectly even when I arrive in the morning.

The new version of Mail obviously can't handle such a large number of folders as its predecessor could. This SHOULDN'T be the case and is clearly a bug in the new Mail app, since the previous versions of Mail had no problem handling a folder structure with such a large number of folders while the new version obviously does, so Apple should definitely look into this. But at least now I'm back to a point where I can actually work with Mail properly and not be afraid of starting a new mail for fear of a crash midway that would force me to start over again... (I had gotten into the habit lately of writing my e-mails in TextEdit and then copying them into a new mail at the last minute and quickly sending before the app would crash!).

I hope this is helpful to others.

Same issue, nothing here fixed it. I shut off all iCloud, Find My Mac, App Store, etc... any Apple services I could find. Then it worked again. As soon as I enable any Apple login it freezes. Logging into this forum froze my Mail. Whatever it is has to be related to Apple connecting to my Mac.

I like the original poster, have had persistent Mail freezes for a period of weeks. I've done various things such as deleting my plist file http://smallbusiness.chron.com/reset-apple-mail-preferences-73043.html. This would work for one or two times, but then go back to the bouncing ball.

I unchecked Mail in my iCloud preferences today, and for the first time in days the application loaded perfectly, and remained stable for a few minutes so far anyway (crossed fingers).

I like an earlier poster have a complicated Mail folder structure, but have never had problems until now.

iMac 21.5" Late 2009 OS X Yosemite 10.10.3

First, I would like to thank everyone for their assistance and feedback on this thread. I tried all the recommendations from here and various other forums nothing on here worked for me but I was able to find another solution that did work.

Credit to Gee Are Pabst

It seems that Mail cannot properly manage the prior saved state. Hence, this could be the reason for Mail crashing, especially for the ‘Yosemite Mail not responding’ crash. The solution is to remove Mail’ prior saved state and then re-launch Mail.

How to remove Mail saved state:

1. Force quit of Mail app (‘Application not responding‘ issue!).
2. Go to the Finder.
3. Hold the Option key and then select ‘Library‘ from the ‘Go‘ menu.
4. Go to the folder ‘Containers > com.apple.mail > Data > Library > Saved Application State‘ and move the folder called ‘com.apple.mail.savedState‘ to the trash.
5. Empty trash.
6. Restart your Mac.
7. Re-launch Mail.

This was a lifesaver for me and seems to be working after 3 to 4 hours of testing. My mail would become unresponsive after 5 or 10 mins max. I hope this is the final fix I have to attempt and I wanted to spread the love.

Here is the original link.

https://miapple.me/fixing-mac-os-x-10-10-yosemite-mail-not-responding/

Thank you ronfromhonolulu! I've tried everything to solve the problem with no result, but your trick really works. It's clear it is an apple mail bug, but I don't understand which is the relationship between hanging and the preference panel. Now all works properly, only mail is a little bit slower at startup. No problem. however. I hope Apple may resolve this issue in the next release, also if it seems Apple pays less and less attention to its products than some year ago.

i have the same problem, Mail freezes after it opens.

I discovered that Mail freezes only when opened in INBOX.

If you quit Mail when a single inbox account is selected it never freezes when you launch the app the next time.

To contribute my own workaround to Mail hanging,

Mail.app often hangs after a few hours, and once its force quit, it will hang again within a moment of being re-opened. The left column panel of accounts and folders will be responsive but the central main column panel will not respond, and the app won't quit without being forced to.

If I immediately take all accounts offline, and then take them online one at a time, this prevents it from re-hanging, after a force quit. I have around 6 mail accounts in use.

OSX 10.10.5

As per RonfromHonolulu's post (attached below)...leaving my Accounts page open in System Preferences worked for me! My Mail no longer "hangs" and I've started to receive my email again! Sweet....

Just wish I could get the root cause identified and fixed!

It bothers my OCD that there is a bug somewhere : )

ronfromhonoluluMay 25, 2015 8:49 PM Re: Mail App Freezes/Hangs OS X 10.10.2
Re: Mail App Freezes/Hangs OS X 10.10.2in response to myopicpaideiaHelpful

My problem with Mail on Yosemite has been the same on three different Macs; new iMac with Retina display, new MacBook Pro with Retina display, and older iMac. Same issue. Half the time or more Mail freezes up upon launch, which required a Force Quit. Upon restarting, most of the time Mail would function OK, but occasionally hang again, always with the same error-- Application Not Responding. I've tried every fix on this thread and other website threads to get it fixed with nothing working.

Here's what I did to fix it.

I left the Mail Preferences window open to Accounts. That's it. Now, when I restart the Mac or it starts up automatically in the AM, Mail launches as per normal, but with the Preferences window open to Accounts. No problems since. None. Zero.

I have over a dozen email accounts, all IMAP, ranging from Apple's iCloud to Gmail to standard IMAP accounts, personal and business. Obviously, there's a bug somewhere. I came upon the fix by disabling all email accounts, re-enabling each, one-by-one, then doing a shutdown and startup. About five re-boots in I inadvertently left the Preferences window open to Accounts. No freeze on the next reboot. When I close Preferences, the freeze begins again.

It's a cheap fix but it took a long time to get to it.

i have this problem after most system updates. sometimes it's as easy as force quit and relaunch. more and more, it's not. i open the system preferences and go to internet accounts. i use many alias accounts. i uncheck the enabled button on each one. don't worry, once things are working again, all it takes is clicking that button again to enable. you won't have to set up the accounts again. anyhow, i turn off all or most of the accounts and then launch mail. it has worked for me every time to get mail to fully launch. if i left any accounts active, they usually will all connect and do their thing. if the program hangs, it means i tried to shortcut and didn't disable enough accounts. with all disabled, it has never failed to fully launch. then i open mail preferences and bring the accounts back online. it's best to do them in small batches. let the mail come in. quit and relaunch. add more enabled accounts. repeat till all the accounts are enabled again. as of late, i have to repeat this process a few times before the kinks go away. but they do go away. sometimes the final batch of accounts being enabled sends it hinky again. i repeat the process because this is the only way i've discovered to get the program to launch so you can **** around with it. a lot of the suggested fixes posted here involve the program to load and let you into preferences and the mailboxes. when i have this problem, mail never loads beyond putting up an empty message viewer window. then i get to watch the pretty swirling rainbow till i force quit. there is no rebuilding mailboxes or changing preferences if you can't get in. the system preference to disable the internet accounts will at least get you into the program. then you can pick your fix from all these entries. good luck and if anyone knows why this happens after every system update, i'd love to know. more importantly, i'd love for apple to know so i can quit wasting my time with every update!