Finder Favorites Disappear Randomly

Question

Level 1

4 points

Finder Favorites Disappear Randomly

Finder Sidebar favorites from a server disappear when disconnected. Not everytime, sometimes they all stay. Other times it's only a few, and often they aren't currently open/in use so I'm unclear what triggers the flush. It seems random. It would be hugely helpful if they could be persistent because I cannot control the vpn disruptions (autoconnect is a paid feature and the company uses the free version) and redragging them when I restore the connection is frustrating. They stay some of the time, so I keep using the favorites because overall it's conve. However, it happens frequently enough that I'm finally driven to post about it.

Posted on Oct 31, 2025 7:47 AM

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Answer 1

steve626

Level 6

13,695 points

Oct 31, 2025 8:40 AM in response to firedance431

firedance431 wrote:

... I cannot control the vpn disruptions (autoconnect is a paid feature and the company uses the free version)

Hard to say without more information (such as an Etrecheck report which you could post here), but this appears to be related to networking setup (your favorites point to a server) and VPN is always suspect when networking issues surface, if a VPN is in use. What VPN do you use, is it configured by the company. VPN that are "off the shelf" which sounds like yours is are often problematic, versus a VPN custom configured for a corporate network with a configuration that is implemented, tested, and maintained by the corporate entity tend to work much better.

Can you do a controlled test of disabling the VPN for some period of time to see if the issue resolves? By the way, in some instances turning off or disabling a VPN is not enough because it is still installed and that can continue to impact a Mac's operations.

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Answer 2

den.thed

Level 10

90,718 points

Oct 31, 2025 9:12 AM in response to firedance431

+1

Download and run the free version of EtreCheckPro, from > https://etrecheck.com/en/index.html

Then post back here with your Report, as per > How to use the Add Text Feature When Post… - Apple Community

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