OpenCore Legacy Patcher troubleshooting guides
Worked solutions to the problems patched Macs actually run into — written for the moment something has already gone wrong, with the diagnosis first and the fix second.
If you're not sure where to start, read root patches explained first. One mechanism accounts for the majority of problems on this list, and ten minutes there will save you reading most of the rest.
Root patches, explained properly
What OpenCore Legacy Patcher's root patches actually do to macOS, why every macOS update silently removes them, and how to tell if yours are missing.
A macOS update broke your patched Mac
Installed a macOS update and lost graphics acceleration, Wi-Fi or Bluetooth on an OCLP Mac? Here's the exact recovery order, and how to avoid it next time.
Wi-Fi disappeared after upgrading
Wi-Fi disappeared after upgrading a patched Mac to Ventura or later? It's the dropped legacy Broadcom drivers. How to identify your card and restore it.
Everything is laggy: graphics acceleration is missing
Patched Mac feels like a slideshow, no transparency, video won't play? That's missing GPU acceleration. How to confirm it and restore it, Metal and non-Metal.
Your patched Mac won't boot
Patched Mac won't reach the desktop? Read the screen it's stuck on — Apple logo, prohibited sign, stalled bar and reboot loops each mean something different.
The installer USB won't show up
Made a macOS installer with OpenCore Legacy Patcher but it won't appear when you hold Option? The usual causes, in the order they're worth checking.
“This copy of the Install macOS application is damaged”
The macOS installer reports it's damaged and can't be used. On old Macs this is almost always an expired certificate meeting a wrong system clock. Here's the fix.
Sleep and wake problems on a patched Mac
Patched Mac won't wake, wakes to a black screen, or won't stay asleep? The settings that fix the common cases, and the ones that genuinely can't be fixed.
Uninstalling OCLP without breaking the Mac
Removing OCLP safely: revert root patches first, then remove OpenCore from the EFI partition. Doing it in the wrong order leaves a Mac that won't boot.
Looking for advice on your specific Mac?
How much of this applies depends heavily on which machine you have — whether its GPU is Metal-capable, and whether its Wi-Fi card survived the driver removal in Ventura. We've written that up for the Macs people patch most, including which macOS version is actually the right target and the upgrades worth doing.
Browse guides by Mac modelThese guides are written and maintained independently. For the authoritative project documentation, see the official Dortania guide, and report bugs on the project's GitHub tracker rather than here.