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If you want to Stop CPU Hog PTPCamera Process on your devices. It’s happening again: Just when you need your Mac, you find that it’s running slower than usual for no clear reason. Since the processors are running at 200%, the machine is getting hot. This shortens the battery life and messes up your whole day because your broken computer is stopping you from getting your work done.
A process called PTPCamera is one of these “CPU hogs.” Users of older versions of macOS have noticed that when they plug in their iPhone or a camera, the Mac starts to slow down and the battery drains at an alarming rate. You can also go to the official Apple support site for more information about this error.
If you use Activity Monitor to see what’s taking up most of the Mac’s CPU, you’d see that a process called “Picture Transfer Process for a Camera” seems to be taking up the most time (PTPCamera). It’s important to note that the problem depends on the version, so people who use newer versions of macOS might not have this problem.
How to Stop CPU Hog PTPCamera Process
From Eating CPU and Draining Battery
- Connect an iPhone to the Mac and unlock it via passcode, Touch ID, or Face ID
- Hit Command+Spacebar to open Spotlight (or click the little Spotlight magnifying glass icon in the upper right corner)
- Type “Activity Monitor” and hit return to launch the Activity Monitor app
- Choose the “CPU” tab and click on the “% CPU” column to sort by percentage of CPU usage
- Locate “PTPCamera” and select it, then click the “X” button in the titlebar of Acitivyt Monitor to kill the process
- Confirm that you want to force quit PTPCamera process
- Leave Activity Monitor
Killing the PTPCamera process on a Mac doesn’t seem to have any side effects, and you can still copy photos from your iPhone to the Photos app or Image Capture if you need to. Another option is to try this method, which hasn’t worked for me but may work for you based on what people have said on Apple Support forums:
- Connect via USB the iPhone to the Mac, and unlock it via passcode, Touch ID, or Face ID
- Launch Photos app
- Disconnect the iPhone from USB
- Quit Photos
- Re-open Photos
FAQ
What is PTP camera on Mac?
PTP Webcam is a plug-in for macOS X that lets a DSLR be used as a webcam for video conferencing, streaming, or recording. A DSLR will usually give you a better picture than a webcam built into a laptop or monitor, or even a dedicated web camera. DSLR. Webcam. Left: Nikon DSLR camera with 50mm/f1 lens.
How much CPU usage is too much Mac?
How much CPU should macOS have? Many Mac users are surprised to learn that there is no recommended percentage of CPU use. But it’s clear that the more you use your Mac, the slower it will run. If your Mac’s CPU usage is getting close to 100%, it’s trying to do more work than it can handle.
Why is my CPU usage so high when nothing is running Mac?
If your Mac’s CPU is being used a lot, it could be because malware is running scripts on it. It could also mean that you are trying to do too many things at once or that you are using apps that are too hard for your Mac to handle.
What is PTP connection used for?
“Picture Transfer Protocol” is what PTP is short for. When Android uses this protocol, it looks like a digital camera to the computer. MTP is based on PTP, but it has more features, called “extensions,” than PTP. PTP works the same way as MTP, and digital cameras often use it.