Spell check in Mojave

I'm seeing the same thing, as are other people. Spell check is flagging words like "there," suggesting maybe it should be "their" or "they're" when in fact "there" is correct, or flagging "were" and suggesting "we're" instead when "were" is correct. Spell check also flags words like "by" and "off" and a host of other strange things. Driving me nuts, it's so distracting. I'm going to have to turn check spelling as you type off.

I'm having the same issue. Also, it has stopped making word suggestions when I right click on a word that I just slightly misspell. For example, it has no idea that I when I type "offically" by mistake, that I really meant to write officially, and it won't suggest any correction.

It was working just fine before the update.

The spell check system on macOS is ancient and flawed. Only Apple knows if or when they will fix it.

Instead, you might consider the Grammarly for Mac application, and simply turn off Apple spelling check. There is also a paid (subscription) update to Grammarly Premium that is more extensive than the first link here. Ordinarily, I would also suggest that you try the 7-day trial of Linquisoft's Grammarian Pro 2X, which is quite powerful too. The most recent update was in Nov. 2017, and the author suggests it is compatible with Mojave (which may not be true without a recompile/re-release after the Mojave release date).

I honestly believe that Apple had someone with a tenuous understanding of English making decisions for the spell/grammar testing functionality; someone not too concerned with goals, yet moved to promote the feature as an enhancement. A particular annoyance I have is that it seems to misrepresent certain types of word use as misspellings: to, too, two; there, their, they're; than, then; etc.

This now makes me wonder if they've leveraged at some level some degree of ML to handle language and that perhaps it's still in the learning phase. I hope not.

Me too. It's flagging words like "of" and after I don't know how many years, it seems to have forgotten everything I've ever taught it — and won't learn anything new. **** Mojave is worse than the kids. I hope there is an update coming.

Since upgrading to Mojave spelling errors I make in Pages do not get suggestions offered when I right click the underlined words. Even slight misspellings on right clicking get the "No Guesses Found" message.

This happens for me in iMessages, and other Apple apps. I have nothing in my custom language dictionary nor do I have check grammar with spelling enabled. This started right after upgrading so it is an issue with Mojave and the built in spell checker.

Ironically for words that are actually incorrect the spell checker fails to give recommendations, if I spell grammar as grammer, it doesn't offer grammar as a choice, which if I use Microsoft Word it does as that program doesn't use the system spell checker.

It's telling me that week should be weak. They're should be there. Of should be off. Something is definitely broken here. I don't remember it being this bad until Mojave, but this sort of thing can tend to creep up on you over a few OS versions... Not just in Pages, but in Mail.app, Textedit, anything that uses the embedded Apple spell check. I'm going to send in a feedback message, FWIW...

>… simply turn off Apple spelling check…

How indeed?! There is no switch to turn off speel check in Mac OS, You can only disabled automatic corrections, not the spell check per se. I would appreciate any advice, even a complicated way to turn if off, system-wide. Anyone?

Have the spell check, whether in System Preferences : Keyboard : Text panel, or in the application that you are using — set to your explicit country language, and not Automatic by Language. The latter introduces some wag to the spell checking equation.

I didn't know Pages was having trouble with spelling check in Mojave.....I have had so much trouble with MS Word's spelling and grammar checks since I got Mojave, I was wishing I had the freedom to use Pages (which won't do, for my work)....glad to know that Pages wouldn't be doing me any good either...

Hi! I recently had this same problem (and you're right...it is SUPER annoying). I noticed it after I did the Mojave update too. I spent a good hour and a half on the phone with Apple Support to troubleshoot it. Long story short, we tried a bunch of stuff but what eventually worked was reinstalling the Mojave. The reinstall took a loooong time (over an hour) so do it when you don't need to be on your Mac. The Apple Support guy walked me through how to do it but here is a link that explains it.

http://osxdaily.com/2018/10/10/how-reinstall-macos-mojave/

Best of luck! Hope it helps!

I had this EXACT same problem. Seriously the worst. I spent a long time on the phone with Apple today, and we eventually figured out a solution. They had me reinstall Mojave (which took over an hour so be prepared to be computer-less for a little while). They walked me through the process but here is an article that explains how to do it.

Hopefully you've solved the spell check problem by now, but just in case....hopefully this does the trick for you!

http://osxdaily.com/2018/10/10/how-reinstall-macos-mojave/

Nope. This "Check Spelling While Typing" option is application-based, sometimes only window-based. I.e. in Stickies.app, it works for a single note only! I can disable spell checker this way, for one note – and for all remaining notes, and all new notes, the spell checker is still active. :(

For years, I succesffully used one solution: you could rename a resource in `/System/Library/Services/AppleSpell.service/Contents/Resources` and the spell checker became inactive system-wide. But this doesn't work anymore, Apple changed something in High Sierra and this solution doesn't work since.

The only thing I really wish is to disable the annoying spell checker system-wide. Completelly, kill it. I don't want my computer to check my spelling at all. I hate it.

I have reported this spell check bug to Apple several times because the distraction is driving me crazy when I'm sending emails. I've been using a spell checker for a couple of decades to check spelling as I type and have never encountered anything as mad as this. It's constantly flagging simple, correct words as errors: I typed "Hear hear!" a few minutes ago and it told me that I meant "Here here!" Earlier I had written "It's hotter than it's been all summer", and it told me that I should have written "It's hotter then it's been". To compound that madness, when I quoted those two sentences in an irritated email to a fellow Apple user, it flagged BOTH "than" and "then" as errors: than should be then, then should be than. (And to compound the nuttiness still further, I have the option of getting the spell checker to learn the spelling of words such as "than" and "then"!) That's after all the past instances: "criticism of the kids by the likes of ..." should apparently be "buy the likes of", while "25mm of it [rain]" is supposed to be "25mm off it".

Firstly, the corrections are utter nonsense and not English. Secondly, it is a spell checker. All I require is that my emails are checked for typos. If I type a non-existent word, I would like it to be flagged as an error, as was done in the past. My nerves would benefit greatly if I could have a plain and simple spell checker again, Apple!