How to Fix Mac Migration Assistant Stuck or Freezing Issue

Users who need to transfer from an old Mac to a new one are best off using Migration Assistant over a Wi-Fi or Ethernet connection. Unfortunately, not all transfers go smoothly.

User Story: Migration Assistant Stuck at 1 Minute

“I just bought a new iMac and am trying to use Migration Assistant over Wi-Fi to move everything from my early 2011 MacBook Pro to the new machine. It's been stuck at 'less than a minute remaining' since 8 p.m. last night. That's about 15 hours ago. Any suggestions?”

Various scenarios of migration assistant getting stuck

Some users also report that Migration Assistant gets stuck at the beginning, end, or halfway through the process, with messages such as 20+ hours remaining, less than a minute remaining, looking for sources, looking for apps and documents to transfer, preparing to transfer user documents, or finding other computers.

Simple Steps to Fix Migration Assistant Stuck and Frozen

If you happen to encounter a similar situation where Migration Assistant gets stuck and stops working, here are some troubleshooting steps you can try to resolve the issue.

1. Try Target Disk Mode on the Old Mac.

2. Unplug and plug back in the Ethernet cable to both machines. This has reportedly gotten the migration process to resume, resynchronize, and complete for some users.

3. Try migrating everything except your “Apps,” and then manually reinstall the apps you need on your new Mac.

4. Run a Hardware Diagnostics test to check for any hardware issues with your Mac.

5. If you have a Time Machine backup available, try to migrate from a Time Machine backup.

Try using a reliable alternative to Migration Assistant to resolve the freezing issue.

Sometimes, even after trying all possible solutions, you might not be able to fix the Migration Assistant getting stuck issue. In this case, we recommend you try using a Mac backup software to handle the migration from one Mac to another via disk cloning. It's a simple and practical way to deal with the Migration Assistant getting stuck issue.

1. Connect the new Mac to your old one, then launch the Mac cloning software.

2. From the “From” pop-up menu, select the old Mac's disk that you want to clone.

3. From the To pop-up menu, choose the new Mac disk as the destination for your copy.

4. Set the disk cloning options. You can exclude files or folders, if necessary.

5. Finally, click the Start button to perform the cloning operation.