I am trying to log into a different iCloud account on my mid 2011 iMac but I can't uncheck find my mac to complete the process. I keep getting this error:Find My Mac couldn’t be disabled. Please try again later.
iMac, macOS Sierra (10.12.1)
Had this problem too. Wanted to "retire" an old iCloud account but it wouldn't let me uncheck 'Find My Mac' in order to sign out.
Found a solution though:
1. Open Terminal
2. Type
defaults delete MobileMeAccounts3. Press Enter
When you return to the iCloud menu in System Preferences, it should look "new" again.
Had this problem too. Wanted to "retire" an old iCloud account but it wouldn't let me uncheck 'Find My Mac' in order to sign out.
Found a solution though:
1. Open Terminal
2. Type
defaults delete MobileMeAccounts3. Press Enter
When you return to the iCloud menu in System Preferences, it should look "new" again.
I can too confirm. The user account you have to be logged into has to be an administrator, and has to have an account that isn't blank. I changed the password from a blank one to something else and closed out of System Preferences and opened it back up, went into iCloud and I was able to uncheck Find my Device from the iCloud account and ultimately able to log out of the iCloud account at that point.
Before logging into this "different iCloud account", did you log out of the other account completely?
That's the problem...I can't fully log out because first I have to make sure all of the iCloud items are unchecked (keychain, notes, safari, etc) and when I uncheck find my mac, it asks me for my password, which I enter and that is when I get the error message_Find My Mac couldn’t be disabled
Why do you have to make sure they're all unchecked? Just go to System Preferences > iCloud > Sign Out.
yes. I understand and I meet the same problem
Might be a corrupt .plist.
Do a backup, preferably 2 backups on 2 separate drives.
Quit the application.
Go to Finder and select your user/home folder. With that Finder window as the front window, either select Finder/View/Show View options or go command - J. When the View options opens, check ’Show Library Folder’. That should make your user library folder visible in your user/home folder. Select Library. Then go to Preferences/com.apple.systempreferences.plist. Move the .plist to your desktop.
Restart the computer, open the application, and test. If it works okay, delete the plist from the desktop.
If the application is the same, return the .plist to where you got it from, overwriting the newer one.
Thanks to leonie for some information contained in this.
I know this reply is way late but I wanted to put it up here for anyone new searching for a answer. In bought my wife a used Mac book pro tonight. She logged into a old iCloud account of hers on accident. When trying to sign out she was getting the message. Could not turn off find my Mac. Upon sheer randomness I created a password for her user account "the admin account". Once I created a password I went back and tried to sign her out of her iCloud account and voila problem solved. Hope this helps as I am not a computer person!
That did it! I had a 'blank' password on User account... put in a random word and hey presto! Funny how they're linked and some intuitive random error twigged the link between User pass and Apple ID pass.... Hmm!! 😝
Thank you so much! If anyone else is looking for a solution to this problem, THIS is the answer!
Thank you for sharing this to us! It's a really good help 🙂
Can't uncheck find my mac
