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Is there a way to tell Steam on Mac to not update itself when it hasn't been manually launched?

I have now seen problems with this on two MacBooks. Without even trying to run Steam for anything, suddenly the system slows to a crawl, sometimes the entire screen even goes black, other programs I'm using stall with the wait timer icon, and then a progress dialog appears showing how far my unwanted Steam update is progressing.

Short of deleting Steam, is there a way to make it not update itself when not being used?

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  • Do you let Steam launch on startup? Since it's just a program like any other, not a system process of some kind, I can't imagine how it could be running itself otherwise. – SevenSidedDie Feb 20 '15 at 19:06
  • I ran the Steam installer without noticing that I had any control over whether to let Steam launch on startup. Is there a place to tell it not to load on startup? When it's running in the background, is there a place to tell it to stop once it is loaded? – Dronz Feb 20 '15 at 19:11
  • Normal Mac programs can't run in the background, so just switch to it and ⌘Q or use the menu to quit. I'll write up a proper answer with a screenshot of how to prevent it from launching on startup. – SevenSidedDie Feb 20 '15 at 19:14
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Steam's option to launch on startup is on by default. You can change it by going to the menu bar and choosing Steam → Preferences… to open Steam's Preferences window. Then in the Preferences window choose Interface (I know, that's not intuitive, is it), and uncheck Run Steam when my computer starts:

Steam Preferences window with a freehand circle around the "Run Steam when my computer starts" option

To stop an already-running Steam, just switch to its window and quit using the menu (Steam → Quit) or the Quit keyboard shortcut (⌘Q).

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