Fix Guide: Tahoe Mail Indexing Loops
Symptom: The Mail app on Tahoe shows a "Downloading Messages" or "Indexing" progress bar that never completes, often consuming 100% of a CPU core.
Why this happens
The Tahoe Mail database schema update can fail if there are orphaned attachments or corrupted V11/V12 folder structures.
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Fix 1: Force Reindex of Envelope Index
- Quit Mail.
- In Finder, go to
~/Library/Mail/V11/MailData/(or V12 in Tahoe). - Delete any files starting with "Envelope Index".
rm ~/Library/Mail/V12/MailData/Envelope\ Index*
- Re-open Mail and wait for the reindex to complete.
Fix 2: Clean the Mail Cache
- Open Terminal.
- Run:
rm -rf ~/Library/Containers/com.apple.mail/Data/Library/Caches/*
- Restart Mail.