Monterey Installation Stuck In Loop: Fixed

Is your Mac installation stuck/frozen or is slow when you’re upgrading to macOS 12 Monterey? Specifically, your Mac installs are stuck on the Apple logo with a status bar showing the progress as the software is loading. Mac update is stuck on a gray screen, white or black screen; or your macOS update is extremely slow. Or sometimes, After downloading and going through installation it said ‘an error occurred preparing the update’. And macOS assistant just froze and did nothing for hours, or is extremely slow.

What to do if your macOS Monterey installation can’t be completed, get stuck, frozen, or is extremely slow? Here some tips are shared to fix the Mac installation stuck problem.

1. Backup File Data on Mac before macOS 12 Installation

It’s better to “have a mac backup” because sometimes, Mac update software stuck results in unexpected data loss. So use any software to bulk back up photos, videos, music, ringtone, ebook, etc on your Mac before you install the new macOS Monterey.

Plus, after you backup macOS data, there is more memory to install macOS Monterey, less chance for stuck, slow issues.

Also Read: Drag And Drop Issues In macOS Monterey

2. Make Sure Your Mac Installation Got Stuck Really

Firstly, you need to check if your macOS update gets really stuck since the macOS upgrade takes a very long time. Usually, a couple of hours are needed. Of course, there are exceptions as well. Sometimes updates can take 16 hours or more. So it’s quite essential to see the Log to make sure whether your Mac is still installing macOS Monterey normally.

Just press Command + L, you can see the detailed remaining time of the whole Mac installation, what files have been installed, what files will be installed next. If the Log screen shows that nothing is happening, your Mac installation is stuck/frozen indeed.

3. Solutions to Fix Mac Installation stuck and other errors.

If your Mac is unable to install macOS Monterey or freezing on installing, try the following fixes to solve this annoying issue. Hopefully, any of the following approaches will work for your macOS installation problem.

1. Check if your Mac supports macOS 12 Monterey

The macOS 12 has far higher demands on your Mac computer hardware configurations. That’s to say, your antique Macs are not welcome in the 2021 newly released macOS Monterey. Before you install macOS Monterey, check if your Mac is included in the macOS 12 supported Mac list:

Here are the devices that can run macOS 12 Monterey:

iMac Pro 2017 and later
iMac late 2015 and later
MacBook early 2016 and later
Mac Book Pro early 2015 and later
MacBook Air early 2015 and later

2. Shut down your Mac and wait for some time.

When a new OS releases, a massive number of people will go to download and install the updates in a snap. As a result, the downloads and installation will be very slow with the large file and many people doing the same thing at the same time and even fail during the process.

You should wait for the server to become available. According to the Apple system status page, the macOS Software Update issue has been resolved. Now you should download the macOS Monterey update file faster and install it without seeing the “An error occurred while installing the selected updates” message.

3. Download & install the combo update.

The Mac App Store isn’t the only place to download macOS from. When your encounter problems with macOS Monterey installing, you can try to download the combo macOS update from the Apple official site. Because the macOS installation package downloaded from Mac App Store may only include the essential files for your Mac update, instead of the combo updater with all the files required to update to macOS.

Also Read: Mac keeps Freezing After Installing macOS Monterey? Try These Fixes.

4. Install in Safe Mode.

Safe mode is a way to start up your Mac so that it performs certain checks and prevents some software from automatically loading or opening. When your Mac installation is stuck or Mac runs slow when Monterey installing, you can install in Safe Mode so that you’re able to resolve issues that might keep your Mac from completely starting up, or to isolate other issues related to your startup disk.
The suggestion is to force shutdown by any and all means including the Power Button.

Disconnect any and all external drives.
Plug into charger
Restart the computer and Immediately Hold the SHIFT key until the Apple Logo appears and then release.
This Safe Mode does a Repair Disk, clears cache files, and will only load Apple Software, extensions, and fonts.
This mode may or may not allow the upgrade process to complete and hopefully successfully

Also Read: [FIXED] ‘Not Enough Space for macOS Monterey’ Error

5. Reset NVRAM

NVRAM (nonvolatile random-access memory) stores certain temporary settings like display resolution, startup disk selection, and recent kernel panic information. Resetting it will clear up all misconfigurations that could stop the new macOS Monterey update from installing.

Shut down your Mac and wait for 10 seconds to let the Mac completely turn off.
Restart your Mac and immediately press and hold the Command + Option + P + R keys.
Keep holding these keys for about 20 seconds. You can release the keys when your Mac appears in one of the following situations:
(A)On Mac that plays a startup sound
(B)After the Apple logo appears and disappears for the second time.
Boot your Mac to the desktop and update the Mac again.

6. Clear Mac Storage Space

Click on the Apple icon > About This Mac >Storage to check the space available on your Mac computer. If your Mac doesn’t have enough space, the macOS Monterey installation can be stuck or slow as well. The Monterey installer requires about 12GB. But to install the Monterey update without error, you should at least have 256GB of free space on your Mac.

Thus, you may need to free up your Mac space to solve the Mac installation stuck problem. There are many tools to make this done, use any.

Also Read: Touch ID Not Working After Upgrading To macOS Monterey

7. Reinstall macOS with Recovery Mode

Recovery Mode also works for Mac installation frozen errors. There is a possibility of losing your Mac data with this process. To adopt this solution, you can hold down Command + R at startup. Then recover your Mac from the last Time Machine backup, or from iTunes and iCloud backup.

8. Switch your internet

In some cases, the Monterey installation freezes when the internet is poor. It’s often the case when you see the error “The operation couldn’t be completed. The solution is easy. Check if your Wi-Fi works properly. Switch to another internet, use a VPN, or change the DNS settings.

Also Read: Mac Not Restarting After Upgrading To macOS Monterey? Try These fixes

9. Install macOS from the External Hard Drive.

Well, if you’re still having issues with the installation you could try installing the OS from an external drive. If you actually install macOS Monterey on an external drive, flash drive, or SD card, you can use the external hard drive for Mac as the macOS system disk wherever you go. To make this done, you need an external storage device with a minimum capacity of at least 16 GB and a copy of the macOS 12 Monterey installer.

Finally, when you get the macOS Monterey installed, we advise that you run Disk Utility to correct any issues that might have caused the problem in the first place:

Simply, click on the Finder icon from the dock;
Locate and click to open Applications within the left pane of the Finder window;
Scroll to the bottom of the Applications window to locate and click to open Disk Utility.

Conclusion

Mac failing to complete the operating system update or Monterey installation stuck is annoying especially when you need to explore the new features or upgrade the macOS to be compatible with updated apps. Sometimes, a macOS update might mess up your current operating system and leave you an unbootable Mac. In that case, use the fixes given above.

We hope this article can help you install macOS Monterey on your Mac. Enjoy your new system!