Checking your Mac’s temperature is important to ensuring it lasts a long time and can be helpful in diagnosing any problems with overheating components. Newer Mac models like the Mac Mini M2 or Mac Studio shouldn’t have much of a problem with overheating, but with older Macs this can be more of an issue. If you want to find out your Mac’s processor and graphics card temperatures, here’s how to do it.
If temperatures are soaring, it might be time to do a spring cleaning on your Mac to clean out vents or think about upgrading components to better handle the current workload. In this guide, we detail how to determine the temperature on MacOS for both Intel and Apple Silicon. A random sample is also possible, as is ongoing temperature monitoring.
Check Apple Silicon Mac CPU temperatures using the Hot app
iMazing developed the free, open source app Hot to quickly and easily monitor CPU temperature on a Mac or MacBook. This works on both Apple Silicon and Intel based systems. There are other solutions for Intel Macs described below that also provide GPU data, but for any M1 or M2 based Mac, the Hot app is a free app that is always visible in the menu bar at the top of the screen View.
Step 1: The Hot app can be downloaded from the iMazing website and is located about a third of the way down the free app page.
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Step 2: Open one finder window and select that Applications Folder. Then drag the hot app out of the Downloads folder in dock for the Applications Folder. The app can be started from Launchpad or the Applications Folder.
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Step 3: Look for the Hot app icon, which looks like a flame, in the menu bar at the top of the screen. The average CPU temperature is displayed next to it. Open the Hot app menu to see more options, such as: B. the choice between Fahrenheit And Celsius for the temperature display.
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Get a temperature snapshot for Intel Macs with Terminal
If you’re primarily interested in quickly checking your CPU temperature, there’s an easy way to do this on Intel-based Mac computers without having to download additional tools. It’s a special command you can use in Terminal – macOS’s version of Command Prompt – that starts tracking your CPU temperature. Here’s what to do:
Step 1: Open this terminal app. You can find it by going to dock and select Applications. Here look for the folder named Utilities and open it. The terminal should be in these apps.
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Step 2: With Terminal open, type (or paste) this exact command sequence:
sudo powermetrics –samplers smc |grep -i “CPU die temperature”
Select now Input to enter the command. At this point, you may need to enter your macOS account login password. The Terminal app can be a bit tricky with this as it usually doesn’t display the characters you type, so you have to blindly type in the password and then select it Input again. You do not need to re-enter the command after entering your password.
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Step 3: Give Terminal a moment and it will start creating logs for your CPU temperature. The terminal continues to create a log every few seconds to show how the temperature changes over time and stops when you close the application.
Note that the temperature readings will be Celsius. This is the common format for computer temperature readings. So you’ll have to do a quick conversion in your head to get Fahrenheit numbers, or just type the temperature into Google to get a Fahrenheit translation if you’re not used to working with Celsius.
You can use this command for a CPU readout at any time, but it is a bit tedious for frequent checks. Let’s take a look at an alternative option that is more suitable for long-term temperature management.
Monitor running Intel Mac temperatures with the Fanny app
What if you want to constantly keep an eye on your Intel Mac’s temperature without having to use a command every time? What if you wanted to monitor GPU temperature separately from CPU temperature to diagnose specific problems or just focus on specific hardware?
In this case, we strongly recommend installing the Fanny app. It’s free, lightweight, super easy to use, and provides constant monitoring of your Mac’s performance, including CPU and GPU temperatures:
Step 1: Visit the Fanny Widget site here and select that Download Button.
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Step 2: Fanny will download to your Mac as a ZIP file. Locate the ZIP file, select it to open it, and then select it Fanny to download it. Confirm that you want Open It.
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Step 3: Fanny will not open a new window for you to use. Rather, a small icon will be added to the top right of your Mac. Three lines This indicates that Fanny is working. Select this icon and a new screen will appear.
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How do I know if my Mac is overheating?
It’s important that these apps allow you to monitor your Mac’s temperatures because they can tell you if your Mac is overheating. If you notice problems such as your computer shutting down or restarting unexpectedly or freezing while performing tasks, it may be due to overheating. This is especially the case if these problems occur when the computer is under heavy load, that is, when you are performing a resource-intensive task such as: E.g. use Adobe Photoshop or play a game.
This is because the hardware in your computer, particularly the processor and graphics card, generate heat when operating. Systems exist to dissipate this heat away from the components and toward a fan and vent. However, sometimes they fail to dissipate heat quickly enough and the hardware stops working. This is computer overheating.
You should use these apps to keep an eye on your Mac’s temperatures and determine if temperatures are particularly high before a shutdown or other problem occurs. If so, the problem is probably due to overheating.
For Intel-based Mac desktops and MacBooks, CPU temperatures should be below 45 to 50 degrees Celsius when idle and no apps are active. The device’s temperature rises quickly as more apps are opened, and more demanding workloads result in more heat. Intel Core chips can withstand temperatures of up to 100 degrees Celsius without suffering damage.
Mac and MacBook computers with Apple Silicon processors typically idle at a much cooler 20 to 35 degrees Celsius, but can reach up to 100 degrees when running demanding apps. Examples include those that process 4K ProRes videos or render large 3D graphics scenes. This is expected, and every MacOS PC is designed to increase fan speed and/or throttle processor speed to protect against damage.
However, a broken fan or clogged ventilation can become a problem, so it’s good to keep an eye on this. Ultimately, upgrading components and PCs to newer, more efficient models helps tackle more difficult tasks more easily while keeping computers cooler. We also have a guide to speeding up your Mac, although most of the solutions discussed can also help cool down your processor and GPU.
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