Cannot Set Default Mail App in El Capitan

Problems such as yours are sometimes caused by files that should belong to you but are locked or have wrong permissions. This procedure will check for such files. It makes no changes and therefore is not, in itself, a solution.

First, empty the Trash, if possible.

Triple-click anywhere in the line below on this page to select it, then copy the selected text to the Clipboard by pressing the key combination command-C:

find ~ $TMPDIR.. \( -flags +sappnd,schg,uappnd,uchg -o ! -user $UID -o ! -perm -600 \) 2>&- | wc -l | pbcopy

Launch the built-in Terminal application in any of the following ways:

☞ Enter the first few letters of its name into a Spotlight search. Select it in the results (it should be at the top.)

☞ In the Finder, select Go ▹ Utilities from the menu bar, or press the key combination shift-command-U. The application is in the folder that opens.

☞ Open LaunchPad and start typing the name.

Paste into the Terminal window by pressing command-V. The command may take a noticeable amount of time to run.

Wait for a new line ending in a dollar sign ($) to appear.

The output of the command will be a number. It's automatically copied to the Clipboard. Please paste it into a reply.

The Terminal window doesn't show the output. Please don't copy anything from there.

I don't use Office, but knowing Microsoft, it may be forcing you to use Outlook as your default email reader. If so, you'll either have to get rid of it or refer to Microsoft for support. Before doing that, see below.

Although the problem is not the same, please follow the instructions in this support article to reset the Launch Services database. If you don't already have a current backup, back up all data before proceeding. You may have to log out or restart to see a change.

I currently believe this is a general issue on El Capitan. I have not yet found anyone who could not reproduce the issue. I'm not quite sure why it hasn't gotten more attention (googling reveals very little), but it's probably a combination of the following:

• The delayed reversion to the previously default email application.
• Most often the switch fails, but it appears that some times it does work to switch.
• The first switch (clean install or after resetting the Launch Services database) seems to always work.

So, a workaround does appear to be to reset Launch Services, but it's a bad workaround since it resets all of your custom file type and URL scheme bindings. I don't currently know any other workarounds other than to keep on trying until it sticks.

I've written a bit about the problem in this mailing list post to users of my email application. I also asked for confirmations of the problem on Twitter.

(If anyone from Apple is listening then here is my bug report: rdar://23123392 — only Apple employees can use that link).

I'm having the opposite problem, where I can't get Mail to NOT be the default. However, it seems as long as Mail remains open, the default preference sticks. It only resets when Mail quits. So, not an amazing workaround, you can keep Mail open and running in the background to put the new default into effect.

I had this problem and the solution having read a few posts online was to run Firstaid on your disk, under the Disk utility app and then it held straight away.

Hope this works for you.

I had the same problem with Mail not remembering that my default mail app is Outlook.

I tried the solutions offered here. The only solution that worked for me is here -> https://forums.developer.apple.com/thread/14502

The solution for me was to open Mail, and on the general tab, instead of using the drop down to select Outlook, I clicked on Select and browsed to the app file for Outlook. After I reopened Mail, the setting stuck, so opened a Word Doc, clicked to share via email and Outlook finally opened.

The "reset defaults" suggested has been fine for me...

Simply copy and past this into the terminal:

/System/Library/Frameworks/CoreServices.framework/Versions/A/Frameworks/LaunchSe rvices.framework/Versions/A/Support/lsregister -kill -r -all local,system,user

Hi Linc.

Thank you for your answer. It searches for the roots.

My answer is a large number: 2395

If this is the number of wrong permissions, I suspect I must do a HD check.

Is it right?

problem solved but only for a few minutes sadly

I have the opposite problem - can I delete Mail?

I've been struggling with this issue for days. I followed a previous link in the post to a fix that worked like a charm.

Normally, your change to default email client is saved by LaunchServices, but that database can become corrupted. You can reset the database with the following command in Terminal (copy-paste the whole thing):

No, did not work for me... Still Apple Mail does not remember changes to the default app.