If the message changes, even slowly, then Time Machine is working fine.

Step 2: You will see a progress bar and description like 'Preparing backup', 'ems', or 'ems' on the window.

Step 1: Launch Time Machine by clicking on the Apple logo > System Preferences > Time Machine app.

Steps to check if time machine hangs on preparing backup: How can you tell if Time Machine is stuck on preparing backup? We will explain them in this post and tell you how to fix it with details.

Like the errors ' Waiting to Complete First Backup' and ' Time Machine can't find backup disk', Mac Time Machine stuck on preparing backup could happen in macOS Big Sur, Catalina, Mojave, High Sierra, Sierra and other macOS versions for many reasons. But it is both fun and embarrassing, I’ve found.Time Machine keeps saying 'preparing backup,' but you can't see any other changes happening? If this case remains for hours when you back up with Time Machine, you are likely encountering a Time Machine failure. Restart your Time Capsule if that’s where the backups reside! Unmount the disk, unplug it, and plug it back in if it’s directly connected! Dance around your apartment and forget the blinds are open! Or you’ll know that you need to do some further troubleshooting if the backup still won’t complete. Assuming that everything is hunky-dory, that is.Īfter it’s done, you’ll of course see today’s date appear in the Time Machine preferences window for that disk. When you do that, Time Machine will walk through its typical steps to prepare the backup, and then you’ll get a progress bar for the backup itself. If you’d like to force a backup to a particular disk (even if it’s out of order, from Time Machine’s perspective), right- or Control-click directly on the disk icon of the one in question and choose “Back Up to Now.” If you right-click on the text next to that icon, this won’t work. Once you’re within the Time Machine preferences, you’ll find a list of the disks you back up to with the ranges of dates within which they’ve done backups. (If you don’t see that icon in your menu bar, click on the Apple Menu, choose “System Preferences,” and then select “Time Machine” from the list.)

Doing that is easy through a little hidden menu, so to get to it, start by clicking on the Time Machine icon in your menu bar and choosing “Open Time Machine Preferences.” Sometimes, though, you might need to force a backup to a particular disk maybe one of your backups seems fine, for example, but the other keeps erroring out, and you’d like to reboot your Mac and then test to see if the problem has resolved itself. So when it’s time to do an hourly backup, Time Machine will update the first disk, and then the next hour, it’ll update the second, and so on. So if you’re like me, and you’ve got multiple backups through Apple’s Time Machine software, you may know that the program will switch back and forth between your available disks.

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