Top 4 Fixes for Mac Wallpaper Changing After Restart

Signing in to different wallpapers every time you start your Mac is a strange experience, especially if that’s not your preference and it’s repetitive. Does your Mac’s wallpaper change frequently after rebooting or starting up? Well, in this guide, we have provided you with some effective solutions to the problem.

There are several reasons for this issue to occur. First, your desktop picture may change automatically if your Mac uses a Dynamic wallpaper. Other factors such as software bugs and external display can also affect this complication. Let us guide you through the solutions.

1. Change Display and Wallpaper Settings

While Apple gives you the freedom to use your personal photos as your Mac’s wallpaper, there is a huge collection of wallpapers built into the macOS system. These wallpapers come in different designs and styles. Some are designed to be static (i.e. still images, colors or art), while others are designed to be dynamic – i.e. location, time of day, etc. vary according to factors such as Some preset dynamic wallpapers are also available at intervals (say every X or Y minutes/hour) or based on specific device actions (for example, when your Mac locks or wakes from sleep mode).

If the picture on your MacBook’s desktop changes after a reboot, it may be because you have one of the Dynamic Pictures preset as your default wallpaper. You can fix this in two ways:

1. Disable the image replacement interval for Dynamic Images/Wallpaper or
2. Choose a Static/Still wallpaper.

Here’s how you can do both.

Disable Image Swap Interval for Dynamic Wallpapers on Mac

Stage 1: Launch System Preferences and select ‘Desktop & Screen Saver’.

Step 2: Go to the Desktop tab and notice the rectangle in the upper left corner of the window.

If you see a refresh icon with three arrows, it means your current wallpaper is dynamic and desktop images will change occasionally. To disable this, proceed to the next step.

Stage 3: Under the Desktop tab, uncheck Change picture.

This will stop your Mac’s wallpaper from changing.

How to Set and Choose a Static Wallpaper on Mac

As we explained earlier, Static (or Still) wallpapers do not change their images. To set a Static wallpaper on Mac, go to the Desktop settings page (System Preferences > Desktop & Screen Saver) and click on any wallpaper you want.

If the Replace image and Random order options are greyed out, the selected image or image is a Static wallpaper.

2. Disconnect External Display

We’ve also discovered (from the experience of some affected users) that connecting external displays to your Mac can mess up the wallpaper settings – especially if the display is connected to your Mac during reboot.

A good way to reduce this is to disconnect external monitors from your Mac before pressing the Shut Down or Restart button.

No worries if you forgot to disconnect the external monitor before shutting down your Mac. Make sure to disconnect your Mac before starting it up.

3. Delete Desktop Image Database File

Unless you’re using dynamic wallpaper or have an external monitor connected to your Mac. Still, the wallpaper keeps changing after performing a reboot. Try deleting the database file responsible for macOS’ desktop image. This database file (or .db file for short) is labeled desktop image.dband stores your Mac’s wallpaper configuration.

If this file is corrupted, your Mac’s wallpaper may malfunction. Therefore, deleting may help. It’s nothing complicated and you don’t have to worry about ruining anything. Here’s how to do it.

Stage 1: On your Mac’s desktop, click Go in the menu bar and select ‘Go to Folder’.

Alternatively, use the keyboard shortcut Shift + Command + G anywhere on the desktop.

Step 2: Paste the following path into the dialog and click Go.

This will launch Finder and automatically direct you to the Dock folder where the Desktop Picture database file is located.

Stage 3: Right click on the file and select ‘Move to Pane’.

Step 4: Restart your computer after deleting the file.

After rebooting macOS would create a new database file for Desktop Picture.

Note: Deleting the Desktop Picture database file can reset your wallpaper to factory default. However, it is very unlikely that your Mac’s wallpaper will change after a reboot.

Choose your preferred wallpaper and check if that fixes the problem. Remember, do not choose Dynamic Wallpaper. If you do, make sure to configure the wallpaper without changing the desktop pictures (see method #1).

4. Update macOS

As far as we know, this issue could be the effect of a macOS bug. If none of the above troubleshooting methods fix the problem, update your Mac’s operating system to the latest version (go to System Preferences > Software Update) and see if that helps.

Under control

We hope you have solved the problem with the solutions mentioned above and now you are in control of your Mac’s wallpaper. In the meantime, now that we’re talking about wallpapers, you should check out some cool wallpaper apps for Mac that offer exquisitely curated collections of HD and 4K quality images, artwork, and different categories of wallpapers.

Next: Are your Mac’s desktop icons gone or not showing up? Read the article linked below to know 4 troubleshooting solutions to help recover missing desktop icons.