What is usernoted?

If usernoted is using a lot of processor power in Activity Monitor, here is what is going on.

What is usernoted?

usernoted handles user notifications on macOS. It runs the banners and alerts that slide in from the top right of your screen. Every app that sends you a notification goes through this process.

Why is it using so much processor power?

The usual causes:

• An app is sending too many notifications. A broken app can fire off hundreds of notifications in a loop, keeping usernoted busy without a break.
• A damaged notification database. The file where macOS stores notification data can become corrupt, making usernoted struggle.
• After a macOS upgrade. The process sometimes needs to rebuild its data after an update.

How to fix it

1. Check which app is responsible

Open System Settings, Notifications and look at which apps have notifications turned on. If you recently installed something new, it might be the cause. Turn off its notifications and see if usernoted calms down.

2. Clear the notification database

If turning off individual apps does not help, you can reset the notification database:

rm ~/Library/Application\ Support/NotificationCenter/*
killall usernoted

macOS will build the database again from scratch. You will lose your notification history, but the process should settle down.

3. Restart

Sometimes a simple restart is enough, especially if the problem started after a macOS update.

Should you worry?

No. It is a normal system process. If it is misbehaving, the fix is usually clearing the notification database or finding the app that is flooding it.

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