Any and all advice, guides, and reviews are unbiased and based on my personal experience. If you buy through affiliate links, I may earn commissions, which helps support my website. This does not have an impact on posts or my opinion of any reviewed products. If you find this post helpful and want to say thanks, please buy me a coffee or take a look at my book on Amazon. It keeps this page ad-free. Thank you!
If you are finding that on macOS Monterey (12.5) or other versions that macOS Finder is launching on startup and showing your drive contents, like below, there is an easy fix. No need for terminal commands or other nonsense. Read on!
The issue is a mapped network drive folder. Remove the shortcut or alias and the problem will be solved.
Unfortunately, I have already deleted the mapped drive on my computer in the screenshot above but there was a 5th folder icon to the right of “Users” and the culprit was an alias link to Microsoft One Drive. If you’re in an office environment, it could be network shared drives.
In my case, I uninstalled and reinstalled OneDrive as it’s a known bug that One Drive creates the shortcut alias. I also wanted to make sure I was running the native Apple Silicon version of One Drive. I have also read that the issue can occur if you have the Steam launcher. I have Steam installed but it wasn’t the cause of the problem for me – but worth knowing.
In summary, to fix macOS Finder opening windows on startup, all you need to do is delete the shortcut alias to a network drive from the Macintosh HD Finder.
Finally, keep in mind that macOS Finder always needs to run at startup, it’s a core part of macOS. Finder should always run as a background process on Startup.
Hope this helps!
PS. If this doesn’t help or you’re having some other random window re-open, check this Apple Support Article. It will require restarting your Apple Silicon Mac in Safe mode.
- Shut down your Mac.
- Turn on your Mac and continue to press and hold the power button until you see the startup options window.
- Select your startup disk, then press and hold the Shift key while clicking “Continue in Safe Mode.”
- Log in to your Mac. You might be asked to log in again.
If you’re after more posts I have written about the Mac and macOS, you can check out this link. I document various macOS bug fixes, hacks and. tweaks to make macOS better. I also list my favorite free macOS apps.
Any and all advice, guides, and reviews are unbiased and based on my personal experience. If you buy through affiliate links, I may earn commissions, which helps support my website. This does not have an impact on posts or my opinion of any reviewed products. If you find this post helpful and want to say thanks, please buy me a coffee or take a look at my book on Amazon. It keeps this page ad-free. Thank you!