Open any Mac and count the running processes in Activity Monitor. Fifty is normal. Eighty is common. A well-used machine with years of installed software can easily hit a hundred, most of them things you never deliberately started.
Some of those processes are essential macOS components. Others are helpers that apps registered years ago and that have run every day since, quietly consuming memory and CPU without you knowing they exist.
Background processes vs login items: what's the difference?
This is worth getting clear on before you start turning things off, because the two categories need different fixes.
Login items are things that start when you log in. They include apps that open a window (like Spotify restoring your last session) and background helpers that register themselves at login. If you want the full walkthrough on those, see our guide to how to stop apps launching at startup on Mac.
Background processes are broader. They include login items, but also services and agents that can spawn at any time: when you plug in a device, open a related app, or simply because macOS decided to run a scheduled task. Some never appear in the login items list at all. They're registered as launch agents or daemons, which means macOS itself manages when they start.
The practical upshot: cleaning up your login items helps at boot time. Cleaning up background processes helps all day.
The "Allow in the Background" list (where to find it)
Modern macOS gives you a single panel that covers most background permissions. Go to System Settings › General › Login Items & Extensions and scroll down past the Open at Login list. You'll find a section called Allow in the Background.
Every app listed there has told macOS "I need to run something even when the user isn't using me." Sync clients need this to keep files up to date. Password managers need it for browser autofill. Update checkers need it to phone home. Some apps need it for legitimate reasons. Many apps list themselves here because they can, not because they need to.
For Apple's own reference on this panel, see the official macOS guide to login items and background activity.
Toggling an app off here tells macOS to stop granting it background permissions. The main app still works when you open it manually. It just doesn't get to run things when you're not looking.
Step-by-step: how to disable background processes on Mac
- Open System Settings. Click the Apple menu in the top-left corner and choose System Settings.
- Click General in the sidebar, then click Login Items & Extensions.
- Scroll to the "Allow in the Background" section. This is distinct from the Open at Login list above it.
- Review each item and toggle off what you don't recognise or actively need. Work through the list one item at a time. If you don't know what something is, search its name. If you don't use the app, turn it off.
- Open Activity Monitor to see what's running right now. Press Command-Space, type "Activity Monitor", and press Return. The Memory tab shows what's using RAM; the CPU tab shows what's consuming processor time. You can force-quit individual processes here for an immediate effect, though they may restart unless you've also revoked background permission in System Settings.
- Restart your Mac to confirm the changes. Open Activity Monitor after login and check that the processes you disabled are no longer running.
The whole review takes five to ten minutes the first time. After that, it's worth a quick check once or twice a year, particularly after installing new software.
What's safe to disable
The safest targets are helpers for apps you either don't use often or don't need running continuously. Common ones worth disabling:
- Adobe Creative Cloud helpers (CCD, CCXProcess, CoreSync) - these keep Creative Cloud services running and check for updates constantly. Disabling them does not break Photoshop, Illustrator, or any other Adobe app. It just means Creative Cloud won't auto-open and updates won't install silently.
- Microsoft AutoUpdate (MAU) - Word, Excel, and Outlook all keep working. Updates simply wait until you manually check for them. Many people prefer this anyway.
- Dropbox helpers - only relevant if you've moved off Dropbox or don't rely on it for active file syncing. If Dropbox is part of your daily workflow, leave it running.
- Printer companion apps - HP Smart, Canon IJ Network Tool, Epson status monitors. Your printer will still print. You only need these if you use scan-to-Mac or printer status features regularly.
- Helpers from apps you've forgotten about. If you see an entry and can't place it, search the name. If you don't use the app, disable the helper.
- Game launcher agents (Steam, Epic, GOG) - unless you're actively gaming, there's no reason for these to run background services all day.
The rule of thumb: if the app would still do its job when you open it manually, the background helper is optional.
What you should never disable
Some background processes are load-bearing. Turning these off will cause real problems:
- 1Password, Bitwarden, or any password manager. The browser extension depends on the background helper to fill passwords. Disable it and autofill stops working.
- Dropbox, Google Drive, or iCloud Drive - if you actively use any of these for syncing files, the background process is how syncing happens. Disabling it means your files stop updating.
- Backup software - Backblaze, Carbon Copy Cloner, and similar tools need to run continuously to protect new files as they're created. If you disable the background process, your backups stop.
- Work-required security or management tools - VPN clients, endpoint protection, IT management agents installed by your employer. Check before touching these.
- System-level processes in Activity Monitor. Things like mDNSResponder, launchd, kernel_task, and WindowServer are macOS itself. Don't force-quit or try to disable these. They will restart immediately anyway, and interfering with them can cause instability.
A useful test: ask yourself what would break if this thing stopped running. If the answer is "nothing I'd notice," it's a good candidate for disabling. If the answer is "I'd lose my files" or "my browser autofill would stop," leave it alone.
Using Activity Monitor to spot the rest
The Login Items & Extensions panel only shows apps that have declared their background intent to macOS. Some older helpers and background agents don't show up there at all. Activity Monitor shows everything, regardless of how it got there.
Open it with Command-Space, type "Activity Monitor", press Return. Switch to the Memory tab and sort by the Memory column descending. Look for:
- Processes with names you don't recognise that are consuming significant RAM
- Multiple instances of the same process (some apps spawn several helpers)
- Processes associated with apps you haven't opened in months
If you want to go deeper on reading Activity Monitor and understanding what the columns mean, our guide to how to use Activity Monitor on Mac covers it in full.
You can force-quit a process directly from Activity Monitor by selecting it and clicking the stop button in the toolbar. This is useful for testing: quit the process, check whether anything breaks, then decide whether to make the change permanent via System Settings. Note that some processes will restart automatically within seconds; those are managed by launchd and need to be disabled at the source, not killed repeatedly.
For more on reclaiming the memory these processes hold once you've stopped them, see our guide to how to free up RAM on Mac.
What to expect after you're done
After a thorough review and restart, most people notice three changes. Idle memory use drops, which means apps you actually open have more room without immediately triggering heavy memory pressure. CPU usage at rest drops, which means your fans spin less and your battery lasts longer on a laptop. And Activity Monitor becomes less alarming to look at, because the process count is made up of things you recognise.
The changes are reversible. If you disable something and notice a problem within the next day or two, go back to System Settings › General › Login Items & Extensions, find the item, and toggle it back on. Nothing about this process is permanent until you decide it is.
If your Mac still feels slow after clearing out background processes, the cause may be something else entirely. Our guide to why is my Mac so slow covers the other common reasons: storage pressure, memory swap, and thermal throttling.