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The Sims 4 not launching on macOS Tahoe (26.0.1) with EA App
Hi everyone, I’m having a big issue with The Sims 4 on my MacBook (13”, M1 chip) running macOS Tahoe 26.0.1. Up until Thursday evening the game was working perfectly. But now, when I try to launch The Sims 4 from the EA App: The game doesn’t even show the Electronic Arts/Maxis logo. The folder Documents/Electronic Arts/The Sims 4 doesn’t get created anymore. Instead, the EA Crash Reporter pops up immediately. Here’s what I’ve tried so far: Completely uninstalled and reinstalled both EA App and The Sims 4. Installed the game both on my internal SSD and on an external drive (same result). Cleared EA App cache. Tried running EA App with Rosetta. Checked system permissions for EA App (Full Disk Access enabled). Nothing worked — the game still won’t launch at all. 👉 Has anyone else with macOS Tahoe run into this problem? Is this maybe a compatibility issue with the new macOS version or just a broken EA App update? Thanks in advance!
[READ FIRST] Saves, CC/Mods or Library items disappeared? iCloud issues
ISSUE Saves One minute your game is working fine. The next you go to play and the Load Game button has disappeared, there seems to be no way to play an existing save. CC/Mods Newly added CC/Mods do not show up in your game despite being properly installed (for help with installing 3rd party content see here) or CC randomly starts disappearing from your game. Library items Saving Lots, Rooms and Households to your in-game Library doesn't work CAUSE Most likely the internal storage on your Mac is too full and iCloud is pushing any newly added files to your Documents folder in the cloud. This can happen at anytime. You can check the storage level by clicking on the Apple in the top left corner of the menu bar then About This Mac, then the Storage tab. By default, the game stores your Saves, Mods, Tray (where your Library items are saved) and all your user game data in a folder called The Sims 4 in Documents > Electronic Arts. If there is no Sims 4 folder in this location the game will recreate a new one each time it is launched. If you have iCloud Drive enabled and set to store your Desktop & Documents folder in the cloud it may be moving your existing Sims 4 folder to the cloud, hence the need to create a new Sims 4 folder every time you launch the game. You can check the status of various files and folders, and what the little cloud icons mean, here. FIX Firstly, you MUST free up some space on your Mac otherwise doing this is pointless. Empty the Downloads folder, go through your data and see what you no longer need, empty the Bin. If you have large Photos, Music and TV libraries consider storing them on an external drive. Instructions here on how to do this for your Photos library, the principle is the same for the Music and TV apps. Open System Preferences and then your iCloud settings. What you click on can vary by macOS, check Apple's help page here if you can't immediately find where to look. This is where you can choose what gets stored in the cloud. We are only interested in two settings, iCloud Drive and Optimise Mac Storage Click on Options... in the iCloud Drive setting and make sure Desktop & Documents Folders is unchecked. Scroll down to the bottom of this Apple help page to understand what happens to your data when you turn off the setting. Back at the iCloud settings window, Uncheck Optimise Mac Storage below the list of apps using iCloud. This means that your Mac will stop pushing files to the cloud when the internal storage is getting full. For more info on this setting read this help page. Once you have successfully stopped iCloud from moving the contents of your Documents folder to the cloud you need to move the Sims 4 folder back into the default location - Macintosh HD > Users > [User] > Documents > Electronic Arts Apple explain here what the status of the little cloud icons mean. If you're feeling brave you could consider creating a symlink and storing your Sims 4 folder on an external drive. Or maybe change your EA App Games Library location to an external Drive.🛠️ Creating a symlink in macOS to store the Sims 4 folder on an external drive
➡️ This is not to be confused with installing the actual Sims 4 game on an external drive. The game installation location is determined in EA App and there is no need to use a symlink for this. As internal storage gets smaller we're forced to use cloud based solutions to store files and folders or resort to a trusty external drive. Cloud based only storage is not an option for the Sims 4 folder that contains all your saves, Mods, Library items and other user data because the game only looks in one place for your data: Macintosh HD > Users > [your user account] > Documents > Electronic Arts > The Sims 4 If there is no Sims 4 folder in that location the game will create a new one. There is no way around this default Sims 4 folder location unfortunately, it is hard coded into the game. Because of this the only option to store the Sims 4 folder on an external drive is to create a symbolic link, otherwise known as a symlink. Creating the symlink is relatively easy provided you understand the concept of what a symlink is and why you are creating it. You should also be familiar with Terminal on your Mac and the security and permission systems in place in whichever version of macOS you are running as these dictate the ability for the game to access the external drive and whether your Mac user account has permission to grant the necessary access. You should also make sure you are using a good quality, fast external drive. You get what you pay for and if you bought a cheap drive, with low quality cables, you will most likely struggle to get the symlink to work because it will be too slow. For help buying an external drive and what to look out for read this guide. I am not going to write step by step instructions here, the post will be far too long. Instead, you can read the detailed and comprehensive guide I wrote several years ago here https://bluebellflora.com/saving-your-sims-4-folder-to-an-external-drive/ If your symlink is not working it is down to user error. It really is that simple. macOS is a Unix based operating system and as such uses Unix commands which are all provided in the above linked guide. This thread is for consolidating all posts related to the Mac symlink process here at Answers HQ. If you're a Windows user read Crinrict's excellent guide here https://crinrict.com/blog/2020/02/moving-windows-documents-folder-to-external-drive-via-symbolic-link.html. What I have provided below are a few of the common issues people face as a result of not entering the commands correctly or having the correct permissions in place. Common issues reported and the solution: Always check your external drive has the correct name in Disk Utility: open Disk Utility (Applications > Utilities) change View to Show All Devices then click on the drive in the left sidebar the Mount Point shows the name of your drive. If there is a number added to the drive name it means the drive has not been properly ejected multiple times Close Disk Utility and eject the drive In Finder click on Go in the menu bar then Go To Folder. Enter /Volumes in the input field and hit return in the /Volumes location, trash the folder(s) that has the same name as the external drive Close Finder, plug the drive back in, open Disk Utility again to check the drive name in the Mount Point. If it matches try to create the symlink In addition to checking the external drive mount point above, the following may also be helpful: Terminal states my access/permission is denied check your Mac user account is an Administrator account and not a Standard account. check that Terminal has access to external drives, also known as Removable Volumes, and your Documents folder. I'm constantly getting "Unable to start... Cannot start because the below file appears to be corrupted" error message make sure the external drive is correctly formatted as either APFS or Mac OS Extended (Journaled). If it isn't, reverse the symlink, reformat the drive in Disk Utility and start again. check your Mods actually aren't corrupted by downloading a compatible version from the creator. I keep getting the error message "Unable to start... The Sims 4 is already running" make sure the external drive is correctly plugged in and mounted. check EA App has access to the external drive in System Settings > Privacy & Security. Give it Full Disk Access if necessary. disable iCloud Drive if the symlink folder in Documents is a white page instead of a folder with the little arrow the symlink has broken. Trash it and attempt to recreate the symlink. Check the Mount Point in Disk Utility shows your exact external drive name and doesn’t have a number added to the drive name. If it does this means your drive has not been properly ejected multiple times. To fix it: eject the drive in Finder click on Go in the menu bar then Go To Folder enter /Volumes in the text field and hit Enter/Return in the Finder window that appears you should see a folder, not a drive icon, with the same name as your external drive. Trash it. plug the drive back in, check the mount point in Disk Utility is the exact drive name with no appended numbers, then try to create the symlink again. if the mount point is still showing a number you have problems with your drive. Consider reformatting it, trying different connector cables, or getting a better drive. Terminal tells me No such file or directory did you copy and paste the command from the guide and correctly substitute the name of your external drive? If you didn't copy and paste you may have used the wrong letters in the command. Copy and paste from the guide. Does the folder you are trying to move or create a symlink to exist in the location you are stipulating in the command? Terminal tells me Directory not empty in Step 1 Is there already a folder on the external with the same name as the folder you're moving? i.e. have you already copied over the Electronic Arts folder? If there is already a folder with the same name as the folder you're moving, Terminal will return this result. Terminal tells me File already exists in Step 2 of the guide Did you correctly complete step 1 or is there still an Electronic Arts or Sims 4 folder in your Documents folder? If the folder is still there you have not correctly moved it in Step 1. If you have iCloud Drive enabled to store your Documents folder in the cloud and Optimise Storage enabled, it will cause issues with the symlink. I strongly advise to disable this iCloud feature otherwise you will have issues, especially if you use Mods. As a reminder, creating this symlink is aimed at people storing their Electronic Arts/Sims 4 folder locally. Using iCloud Drive stores your folder in the cloud and locally. For help with iCloud see this thread https://answers.ea.com/t5/Technical-Issues-Mac/READ-FIRST-Saves-CC-Mods-or-Library-items-disappeared/m-p/10242133Game crashing or not loading especially after updating? Post here.
If your game is crashing or not launching after recently updating it please try the two most basic and fundamental steps to resolve it before posting: Repair the game in EA App Test a new clean game. Don't just cherry pick a few files and folders you think you should remove, such as just the Mods folder, or a few random Mods, or any old cache file, or a couple of screenshots, test a completely new, clean, vanilla game. Full instructions here - [INSTRUCTIONS] How to troubleshoot and test a broken game | EA Forums - 11864548 If your game successfully launches with a new Sims 4 folder you then need to figure out what is causing the crashing/failure to load. Again, instructions are in this link - [INSTRUCTIONS] How to troubleshoot and test a broken game | EA Forums - 11864548 . Only you can do that and it can take some time. if the cause is Mods head over to the Mods forum for further help - The Sims 4 Mods & Custom Content | EA Forums if the cause is one or more particular save files, upload them to a file sharing site and post the link here (tag me) or PM me and I can test in my game If your game will not load after repairing it AND testing a completely clean Sims 4 folder please uninstall and reinstall the game through EA App then test, still using the clean Sims 4 folder the game created from the previous step. If you're still having an issue post here with the specs of your Mac. You can find these in Apple > About This Mac: model, e.g. M4 MacBook Pro year, e.g. 2024 macOS version, e.g. Sequoia 15.3.2 (yes, the FULL version is important, with all numbers) memory, e.g. 64GB storage available, e.g. 1.5 TB of 2TB. This info can be found in System Settings > General > About or More Info... in the About This Mac window. Please also post a screenshot showing the contents of the new Sims 4 folder in Finder: make sure the files are in list order in Finder with Dates and Size clearly visible. make sure all files and folders in the TS4 folder are showing, don't cut off the screenshot have the path bar clearly showing in the screenshot: with the Finder window open and selected click on View > Show Path Bar in the menu bar at the top of your desktop. The screenshot should look something like this: Make sure to add a full description of what exactly is happening and what you have tried to fix it in your post. Be constructive to help us help you 🙂 The following are a few examples of short replies that are not constructive: "my game won't work" "my game has broken and I hate EA" "my game only works without Mods and I'm refusing to remove my Mods" "fix it" "my sister's friend's brother's aunty has the same computer and her game works" "I've tried EVERYTHING and NOTHING works"Lagging and stuttering game performance on Macs with M4 chips
This thread is specifically for players using a Mac with M4 chip who have noticed a significant drop in game performance since patching in September 2025 as there has been a small increase in users reporting this recently. Please do not post here if you use any other Mac, look for an existing thread on your issue or start a new one. If you are using a Mac with M4 chip post here if you are experiencing laggy gameplay, stuttering, freezing, low fps. This should be thoroughly tested in a clean game as described here to discount existing user data interference. This is testing specific hardware and operating system. Please post your symptoms and your Mac hardware and operating system. Click on the Apple in the top left corner of your Desktop then About This Mac. Then, click on More Info... which will open System Settings. Scroll down to the bottom and click on System Report. We need the hardware overview and the Graphics/Display overview. All the info required is shown using a red arrow in the below screenshots. are you using an external display? If so what is the size and resolution? does this happen in windowed and fullscreen mode or just one? Models posted so far: M4 Mac mini (waiting for more info) M4 MacBook Air 16GB memory (waiting for more info) M4 MacBook Air macOS Tahoe 26.0 16GB memory 10-core CPU 8-core GPU Using in-built display Windowed and fullscreen
HELP!!!!
So I downloaded the EA app and downloaded my sims 4 game about three times. I have to add ons that download after the sims 4 does. The EA app won't launch the game. It will bounce a few times on the bar at the bottom of my screen but then it'll open the page and close the page again. I have no idea what to do.Buying a iMac
So I'm not really that good at computer stuff but I'm really itching to play the sims again. I don't have the money to buy a proper gaming setup so I'm thinking about buying my sisters old iMac, would it be able to play the sims 4 with expansion packs and other gamepacks smoothly without bigger issues? Below are the specs: iMac (Retina 4K, 21.5-inch, late 2015) Processor: 3,1 GHz Quad-Core Intel Core i5 Memory: 16 GB 1867 MHz DDR8 Graphics: Intel Iris Pro Graphics 6200 1536 MB It has the macOS Monterey Somebody with better understanding of these, please help!
Black Screen, Sims Still Active, Can't Close
Since the Sept 18 update, my game has been moving slow and about 4 times now the entire screen turns black, with the exception of the conversation bubbles, progress bars, and the bottons at the top. It won't let me click the ... button, it won't let me go back to manage world (I can still see that button), but I can still hear them talking and using items. Every time this happens I'm unable to close out my game or even shut it down from the main button at the bottom of my Mac. I play vanilla and have no cc and have never had mods in my game. I play on a Mac Pro with 2 terabytes and before this update I haven't had problems with lag. I have tried repairing my game, shutting down and restarting my computer. I own all packs, but was playing only with base game using the pack selector. I hope that's enough info. I'm not a techie person. Thank you! Edit to add: This is what the screen looks like right before it goes black: Notice all the playable buttons and such are all missing, and so are a couple of the top buttons.
Mouse Pointer Freezing
While playing as a sim in The Sims 4, I cannot move my overhead game view forward via my mouse pointer. I can only adjust my "sky" pov to the left, right, and down via my mouse. And, often when I try to move to the left, my mouse gets "stuck" and glitches, then appearing at the bottom of my screen. However, using the arrow keys does work. I think this may be related to upgrading to macOS 26.0, as I had played The Sims right before I updated and was not experiencing this problem.
Game bugging since update - now can't save progress
Since the recent update my game has been crashing and having difficulty loading. I've repaired the game, rebooted the app and the computer. finally got the game to launch but I can't save at all. I keep getting the error code 403:8717c2e9:56e6ac5c. I've tried to raise a ticket via the EA app but that again is throwing up an error and won't process the request, just states try again. what can I do??? I'm playing on a Mac 15.6 OS with plenty of memory as its brand new
My game won't launch
When i try to launch the sims 4, it will jump in the dock a few times before stopping. I've tried launching directly from dock and launching from the EA app. I've tried reinstalling the game (and checked the reinstallation was compatible through system settings), tried renaming the Tray, Saves and Mods folders (only the mods and saves got new folders, the tray stayed the same) and tried playing without icloud being connected to the desktop which, granted, worked, but it wouldn't keep any saves. Throughout all of this my mods and cc have been stocked away in my personal folders in case any of them being broken was the problem (it crashed when i had mods in, and kept going even after i took them out, that's mostly why i tried reinstalling so i could "clean" the gamefiles if that was the problem) Can anyone help?Game freezes whenever I try to edit lots
I've had this issue the last 10 times I have played The Sims 4. I want to customize my world, but when I go to existing lots in build mode, the game freezes. It will load into the lot and my mouse can move, but I can't move the camera, I can't click on anything, and I can't get out of it without force quiting the game. I'm playing on a MacBook and I have no mods. This also happened when I tried traveling in-game to another lot, but it doesn't always happen, so I'm not sure where the issue is coming from. It is getting really frustrating and affecting my ability to play the game.
Unable to click and drag to move screen while playing
Hey everyone ive had this issue for a few months, and today decided to try and fix it. I updated all my mods before playing, and was having some intermittent freezing of positioning of the camera (aerial view for some reason) that I couldn’t undo. In addition, I was having this ongoing issue of being unable to use my trackpad to click and drag to move my screen. I have to use the keys to move it. The intermittent aerial camera positioning resolved after removing some mods, and I ended up removing all my mods and custom content to try to see if that helped. I also repaired the game. I still can’t drag and click. I took a video after I repaired the game and removed all my customizations, I have a MacBook Air with sequoia 15.6 and an m3 chip, but I can’t upload the video. I saw someone on Facebook had a similar problem a few months ago and someone commented about an all mod update but I didn’t understand what they meant and all my mods were updated and this still wouldn’t work, and now that all of them are gone and it’s still not working idk what to do. The trackpad rotate and finger pinch to zoom in and out still works. I can click on things I just can’t move the screen without using buttons. Nothing with my trackpad moves the screen (except edge scrolling which is enabled in the game settings) despite no changes made to my settings on either my Mac or in game. I took a video to upload here but it won’t let me upload it no matter how short I make the video (under 5 seconds even)SIMS 4 not loading after update
(I dont use mods) Since the update, when i press resume game, the world does not load, it gets stuck on the loading screen. I use a apple mac book pro. This does not happen when I try start a new game - which seems to be working perfectly fine. I don't want to lose my world and start a new one. Will this be fixed in the next update? For reference, I used the "repair" feature on EA multiple times. I completely uninstalled the game and reinstalled it. I also tried to recover old saves of my game and nothing is working.
missing mods
i play sims 4 on mac, so i downloaded some cc for the last time about a year ago and had the mods folder on my side bar on finder and was able to easily transfer my cc from downloads to there but i hadn’t downloaded cc for a while and went to transfer the downloads to the same mods folder as before and then i clicked on the mods folder and it is empty but the mods i downloaded a year ago are still in my game but the same mods folder i had before is nowhere to be found. i swear i have looked everywhere and when i try to add new mods into this empty mod folder, it wont work. probably because i already have the mods folder that does work somewhere else but i cannot find it for the life of me!! therefor i can have no new cc, please help! has anyone else had this problem or know how to fix it??
Stuck on loading screen on Macbook
Everytime I go to save weather that be when going to "save and go" or "save and exit" my game gets stuck on the loading screen and I have to force quit in order to leave it. Does anyone know how to fix this? I already looked at my game files and none of them say they're corrupted, plus I don't have any mods or cc downloaded. I tried google and YouTube, but nothing helpful is coming up for Macbooks.Sims 4 impact and performance on MacBook Air M2
Hello! I use my MacBook Air for school and I want to make sure that playing the sims won't harm the performance of my computer in the long run since it is something I use all the time. Other than school I just use it for browsing, sometimes streaming and I have no other games installed. I am mostly concerned about my Mac slowing down, the battery being damaged, or my computer overheating. I also am worried about the performance of the game when playing. I have about 48 pieces of DLC with plans to get more expansion packs and I do not use any mods or cc. My Mac has an M2 chip, 10C GPU, 16GB, and 1TB. Is this enough for the game to run soothly and are there any precautions I can take to limit any potential technical issues?
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