corespotlightd Causing High CPU Usage on macOS Sequoia? How to Fix It

After updating to macOS Sequoia, I noticed my MacBook’s fans spinning up way more than usual — even when I wasn’t doing anything demanding. Activity Monitor revealed the culprit: a background process called corespotlightd, taking up a huge chunk of the CPU. If you’re seeing the same thing, then this article is for you as well.

In this article, I explain what corespotlightd is, why it might be overactive, and how you can fix or reduce the issue.

What Is corespotlightd?

corespotlightd is the system process that powers Spotlight indexing. It scans your files so that Spotlight — the built-in search tool on your Mac — can return fast, relevant results. Normally, it stays quiet in the background. But when Spotlight gets stuck trying to index certain files, this process can eat up CPU, drain battery, and make your Mac feel sluggish.

Why Is It Using So Much CPU?

Many users have found that the issue often starts after editing or syncing Apple Pages documents, especially when they’re stored in iCloud Drive. Spotlight may be getting stuck in a loop trying to process or reindex those files. In some cases, corrupted or complex documents seem to be the trigger. Even though Apple hasn’t confirmed a bug, the pattern is too common to ignore.

What You Can Do to Fix

1. Look for Problem Files

Open the Pages app and check if any of your documents take a long time to open or behave oddly. Try moving those files out of iCloud Drive and into a folder on your desktop — ideally, one you exclude from Spotlight (I’ll get to that below). This alone can cause the CPU usage to drop within minutes.

2. Restart Your Mac

A simple reboot can sometimes stop Spotlight from spinning its wheels, especially if it’s been trying to index the same file for hours.

3. Rebuild the Spotlight Index

You can force Spotlight to start fresh with its index:

• Go to System Settings > Spotlight (or Siri & Spotlight) > Search Privacy (or Spotlight Privacy), see the screenshot below.
• Click the + button and add your entire drive (e.g., “Macintosh HD”)
• Wait 10–20 seconds, then remove it from the list

Note: We’ve previously covered a detailed guide on how to reindex the Spotlight database on your Mac.

This will make Spotlight reindex everything, which might temporarily spike CPU usage but usually resolves stuck processes like corespotlightd.

4. Clear Spotlight’s System Index Manually

If rebuilding Spotlight from the settings panel didn’t help, you can go deeper:

1. Open Terminal
2. Type the following command:

   sudo rm -rf /System/Volumes/Data/.Spotlight-V100

3. Press Return and enter your password when prompted
4. Restart your Mac

This wipes the system-wide index so it can rebuild cleanly.

See also: Mac Spotlight Search Not Working? Fix

5. Delete CoreSpotlight Metadata

There’s another folder Spotlight uses that can grow huge when Pages documents are involved:

~/Library/Metadata/CoreSpotlight

To check it:

1. In Finder, press Command + Shift + G
2. Type or paste:

   ~/Library/Metadata/CoreSpotlight

3. Delete the contents of the folder (or the entire folder itself), I included the folder screenshot below:

One user noted this folder had grown to over 30GB on their Mac and was clearly the source of repeated indexing loops. After deleting it, the CPU usage by corespotlightd dropped immediately.

6. Clear Out User Caches

Another useful step is clearing cached data in:

~/Library/Caches

Some users found dozens of gigabytes of leftover data there. You can safely delete the contents of this folder — though keep in mind it may affect saved preferences and will rebuild over time.

7. Exclude Specific Folders from Spotlight

If you suspect a certain folder is causing problems (for example, your iCloud Drive Documents folder), you can exclude it from Spotlight indexing altogether:

• Go to System Settings > Spotlight (or Siri & Spotlight) > Search Privacy (or Spotlight Privacy)
• Click +, then add the folder
• Leave it excluded for a while, or permanently if you don’t need to search its contents

This can immediately reduce corespotlightd activity.

Still Seeing High Usage?

Some users have chosen to disable Spotlight indexing entirely using the Terminal command sudo mdutil -a -i off. That’s a drastic step and I do not recommended it unless you’re sure you won’t need search functionality on your Mac, I myself do not use it often.