Why does MacOS automatically launch EVERY application I use after an update?

[zorinlynx]

Every single time, I quit all my apps before running an update. Then after the update, when the machine comes up it launches ALL those apps. Sometimes it launches apps I haven't even used in a while. It seems completely random.

Has anyone discovered a way to stop this? I want absolutely NOTHING to autolaunch after an update. It's just updates, too; if I reboot and log in, nothing is launched.

It's such a pointless feature, because when the apps are relaunched, any context I had when using them last time is gone! There's literally no point to relaunch them until I'm going to actually use them again.

 

[chrismac2]

I'm not an expert by any means, but I wonder if there's some preference file or config file from a previous update when you did have apps open. And now for every update, it keeps using that old file to reopen apps.

Have you tried booting into Safe Mode, and then rebooting again normally? I wonder if that might clear out any rogue config file---course you won't know if it worked until it's time to install the next update. Apple lists that as something to try if after any reboot, it keeps opening apps you don't want it to. I realize that's not exactly your situation, but the fix could be the same.

 

[doogm]

Every single time, I quit all my apps before running an update. Then after the update, when the machine comes up it launches ALL those apps. Sometimes it launches apps I haven't even used in a while. It seems completely random.

Has anyone discovered a way to stop this? I want absolutely NOTHING to autolaunch after an update. It's just updates, too; if I reboot and log in, nothing is launched.

So that screen (the task switcher) is not showing which apps are running - it shows a list of the most recently used apps. Yes, you can swipe them away to force-close them, but just because an app appears on the list, it does not mean that it is running.

iOS is an operating system that concentrates almost completely on the active applications and allows apps that are allowed to occasionally update themselves in the background, but they are not running in the background like on Windows or even MacOS.

It's such a pointless feature, because when the apps are relaunched, any context I had when using them last time is gone! There's literally no point to relaunch them until I'm going to actually use them again.

This is one reason why you shouldn't routinely force-close apps - they lose their state. What happens if you don't force-close them is that iOS has them save their state so that the next time you make it active it can pick up from where you left off. If you force-close it usually causes the phone/iPad to drain more battery, not less, because it requires the app to go through its start-up processes again.

That said - sometimes when iOS runs out of resources and you haven't used an app for a long time, it will force-close the app and you will have lost state anyway.

But they key thing is that the main reason to force-close an app is when it is misbehaving, frozen, etc. I would suggest stop doing this routinely.

 

[Nermal]

I logged this as a bug years ago and was told that it was by design. No explanation for the reasoning was given.

I always log out and back in after an update, so that the system is reasonably "fresh".

 

[chrismac2]

iOS is an operating system that concentrates almost completely on the active applications and allows apps that are allowed to occasionally update themselves in the background, but they are not running in the background like on Windows or even MacOS.

He's referring to macOS, not iOS

 

[gilby101]

It's such a pointless feature, because when the apps are relaunched, any context I had when using them last time is gone! There's literally no point to relaunch them until I'm going to actually use them again.

I agree. This seems to have been a change with recent macOS 15 updates. Never happened in the past.

I do wonder if this is part of the continuing iOS-ification of macOS, and we are being softened for the rumoured macOS 16 changes.

 

[Le Big Mac]

I'm not an expert by any means, but I wonder if there's some preference file or config file from a previous update when you did have apps open. And now for every update, it keeps using that old file to reopen apps.

Not sure either, but my guess as to what's happening (I notice this too) is it may take a snapshot of what apps are open a few minutes before you do the update rather than right as you restart to update. There are some apps that hang the restart (e.g. - do you want to save the work) so I hit save, quit them, and even those reopen.

For some people this may make sense - i.e., if you have to quit an app to restart you may want it to reopen along with the rest of them. I realize this is not you.