The slow launch times can happen after a reboot or even if you haven't rebooted but haven't used Affinity for an extended period of time. My disappointment is that the apps downloaded from Affinity direct have never shown the delay, and now they are. Frustrating. M1=speed, except for Affinity.
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Launching apps slower on M1 Mac Mini than Intel?
- Thread starter DEMinSoCAL
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This is NOT an M1 issue. Same behavior on Intel Macs. Either either an App Store issue, or Affinity doing some initial checks.
I'm also experiencing launch delays in Affinity Photo and Designer on my M1 MBP, however using the standalone versions from Serif's website rather than the App Store version
Same problem, with Intel Mac Mini 2014... the three apps take a long time to launch. App Store versions.
Official Serif´s Forum has an open thread about this problem: Startup performance 1.8.6
Official Serif´s Forum has an open thread about this problem: Startup performance 1.8.6
I see this on my 16" MBP. Looking at Activity Monitor while it is launching, syspolicyd is spinning at 100% CPU during that 15 second startup time.
It's the same for me. But I've noticed this across the board compared to Windows: Microsoft Office, Chrome... all native but they all seem generally slow to open. This M1 Air is my 2nd Mac (1st one being a mid 2012 13' Pro) and I was expecting this thing to fly but some apps take forever to load... subsequent openings dramatically reduce load time.
All the Affinity apps have been this way for years, I see it the same on my 3 Intel Macs and M1 Mac. Doesn't matter if its from the App Store or direct download.
So after a restart of your Mac, Affinity Designer 1.9 opens in less than 4 seconds?
Affinity Suite always opened in around 3-4 seconds on my mid2012 MBP 13' with an average SSD in it. In Windows, on a pc with a NVMe drive, it also takes like 2-3 seconds to open. On my M1 Air it either opens in like 1-2 seconds or like 7-8 seconds, looking like I have an HDD in my Air... but this slow opening time happens with the majority of 3rd party apps on my M1 Air. I'm so used with my iPhone opening apps extremely fast that the Air feels like an average computer form 2011 in this regard. Keep in mind that I've wiped my drive and reinstalled Big Sur from scratch.
You could try opening your Console, click on "Start Streaming" and then open your apps to see if anything relevant stands out under the "Errors and Faults" tab.
To OP: this delay of 17sec is happening due bug with syspolicyd process on M1.
On affected system - if you launch Activity Monitor and look at CPU resources - then launch Affinity software - syspolicyd will spike to 60-70% of CPU.
Syspolicyd is linked to SIP, protection against system integrity attacks. On M1 it works slightly different as SIP in M1 is more restrictive.
On fresh installs - there is no issues.
It will work normally without delays.
But if you fiddled with SIP or Recovery terminal commands (still has to be determined which ones) - this syspolicyd bug is triggered and will persist until you reinstall/update the OS.
It manifests as super slow 1st launch of the apps after boot. But consequent launches will be happening normally.
Reboot again - and 1st launch of the same app will be again super slow, but the next one will be normal. Most people dont notice this at all - but... some do...
To only solution to this - that I am aware of is reinstall. I noticed this bug incidentally when I migrated apps from M1 MBA (affected with bug) to my new M1 MBP (fresh install) and immediately noticed difference in launch speeds. Launching activity monitor on both devices - syspolicyd process was having completely different behaviour.
On affected system - if you launch Activity Monitor and look at CPU resources - then launch Affinity software - syspolicyd will spike to 60-70% of CPU.
Syspolicyd is linked to SIP, protection against system integrity attacks. On M1 it works slightly different as SIP in M1 is more restrictive.
On fresh installs - there is no issues.
It will work normally without delays.
But if you fiddled with SIP or Recovery terminal commands (still has to be determined which ones) - this syspolicyd bug is triggered and will persist until you reinstall/update the OS.
It manifests as super slow 1st launch of the apps after boot. But consequent launches will be happening normally.
Reboot again - and 1st launch of the same app will be again super slow, but the next one will be normal. Most people dont notice this at all - but... some do...
To only solution to this - that I am aware of is reinstall. I noticed this bug incidentally when I migrated apps from M1 MBA (affected with bug) to my new M1 MBP (fresh install) and immediately noticed difference in launch speeds. Launching activity monitor on both devices - syspolicyd process was having completely different behaviour.
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Mine open up almost instantly. Not sure if anyone has mentioned this but Rosetta 2 is not being used.
Affinity suite is now native on M1 Apple Silicon (and has been for a while)!
Clean new M1 Mac here, downloaded Affinity from App Store (no previous installs), also have the 20 second launch time
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Affinity have suggested making a copy of the apps and loading from those. Then after the initial load it will load quite quickly, even after a reboot. I can confirm that seems to be working so far. I made a copy to my downloads folder then copied those back to the applications folder to overwrite the originals.
There is definitely a problem with launch times on the Affinity apps downloaded through the App Store. This started a couple of months ago and they are still trying to find a solution. It does not affect the versions that Affinity offers on their site only on the App Store versions. It is not M1-specific. the same kind of startup slowness happens on Intel.
It seems to be caused by something that the App Store does on install. As Steeley mentioned, one way around it is to copy the app files to a different location and then copy them back to Applications replacing the originals. that will take the start times from around 20-30 secs to 2-5 seconds. Each update resets this and you need to recopy the files again.
Affinity are certainly working on it but it seems to be something in the App Store causing it.
It seems to be caused by something that the App Store does on install. As Steeley mentioned, one way around it is to copy the app files to a different location and then copy them back to Applications replacing the originals. that will take the start times from around 20-30 secs to 2-5 seconds. Each update resets this and you need to recopy the files again.
Affinity are certainly working on it but it seems to be something in the App Store causing it.
As I wrote above - launch Activity Monitor and switch to CPU tab...
Then launch any Affinity app but observe CPU tab on Activity Monitor.
If during that long app boot syspolicyd process takes 60-70% of CPU load, then its a SIP issue. Issue is not isolated to Affinity but to MS Office too, SketchUp and other apps with larger binaries.
Then launch any Affinity app but observe CPU tab on Activity Monitor.
If during that long app boot syspolicyd process takes 60-70% of CPU load, then its a SIP issue. Issue is not isolated to Affinity but to MS Office too, SketchUp and other apps with larger binaries.
I use Affinity Photo/Designer/Publisher on my M1 MacBook Air (Downloaded from the website, not the AppStore ones), and they have been slow as molasses in January since I got my M1 in December.
However, with the latest 1.9.1 updates, which came out at the end of February, the launch speed is no longer an issue for me.
They have been launching so quickly that until now I hadn't bothered even thinking about the time it took. But as we are specifically discussing it, I just whipped out my timer to do a test and each of the apps now launches in under 2.5 seconds.
So, if you haven't already I'd suggest updating to 1.9.1, it's made a massive improvement to mine.
However, with the latest 1.9.1 updates, which came out at the end of February, the launch speed is no longer an issue for me.
They have been launching so quickly that until now I hadn't bothered even thinking about the time it took. But as we are specifically discussing it, I just whipped out my timer to do a test and each of the apps now launches in under 2.5 seconds.
So, if you haven't already I'd suggest updating to 1.9.1, it's made a massive improvement to mine.