This is because – as you would expect – resetting a Mac to factory settings gets rid of all the data stored on that machine.ĭon’t fall in to the trap we fell into: Because we use iCloud to sync all files across all our Apple devices we assumed that we could just recover everything we needed from the cloud – which was true to a certain extent, but it wasn’t until after we wiped the Mac that we realised that the data for one non-Apple app we used wasn’t in the cloud. We’ll run through the new steps below.īefore you do anything you should back up or clone your Mac.

Restore your Mac to its factory settingsįirst a bit of good news: If you have macOS Monterey on an M1, M1 Pro, M1 Max, or a Mac with a T2 chip, the process for erasing the content on your Mac has just got so much easier thanks to a new option in System Preferences.

Click “System Preferences” in the menu bar and choose “Erase All Content and Settings” in the menu. When System Preferences opens, ignore the window that appears and look at top of the screen again. In the menu that appears, select “System Preferences.” To get started, click the Apple icon on the menu bar in the upper-left corner of the screen. If you have a Mac that uses Apple Silicon or has a T2 Security Chip running macOS Monterey or later, you can quickly wipe your Mac using System Preferences. RELATED: How to Update Your Mac and Keep Apps Up to Date How to Erase all Content and Settings on a Newer Mac Luckily, we’ve laid out how to do that in a separate article aimed at older machines, but we will also cover the process briefly below.Īlternatively, if the Mac you want to wipe includes a T2 chip or Apple Silicon and supports upgrading to macOS Monterey or later, you could perform the OS update first before using the “Erase All Content and Settings” feature to wipe your Mac.

If you have a Mac running a version of macOS older than macOS Monterey-or your Mac lacks the hardware features mentioned above-you’ll need to perform a more complex series of steps to factory reset your Mac, such as reinstalling a copy of macOS from Recovery mode.

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