Keep Your Mac Awake for Printing

Emails print fine while you're at your desk. You leave for lunch, nothing prints. You come back, touch the trackpad, and the whole backlog comes out at once.

That's not AutoPrintEmail stalling. That's your Mac falling asleep the moment you stop using it, and a sleeping Mac can't print. AutoPrintEmail watches your mailbox for you, so Mail doesn't need to be open. The Mac just has to stay awake.

Two settings fix it. Which one depends on whether you have a MacBook or a desktop Mac.

Table of Contents

• MacBook: Turn Off Sleep on the Charger
• iMac, Mac mini, Mac Studio: Turn Off Sleep
• On macOS Monterey or Older
• Closing the Lid Puts a MacBook to Sleep
• Quick Fix Without Changing Settings
• Still Stopping?

MacBook: Turn Off Sleep on the Charger

On macOS Ventura and newer (13+):

1. Open the Apple menu → System Settings
2. Click Battery in the sidebar, then Options… at the bottom
3. Turn on Prevent automatic sleeping on power adapter when the display is off
4. Set Wake for network access to Always or Only on Power Adapter

This only works while the charger is plugged in. On battery, macOS will still sleep, so leave the print MacBook on power.

iMac, Mac mini, Mac Studio: Turn Off Sleep

1. Open the Apple menu → System Settings
2. Click Energy in the sidebar (called Energy Saver on some versions)
3. Turn on Prevent automatic sleeping when the display is off
4. Turn on Wake for network access

The screen can still switch off to save power. That's fine. The screen sleeping isn't the problem. The Mac sleeping is.

On macOS Monterey or Older

The setting has a slightly different name. Go to System Preferences → Energy Saver (or Battery → Power Adapter on a MacBook) and tick Prevent computer from sleeping automatically when the display is off.

Closing the Lid Puts a MacBook to Sleep

The setting above does not cover a closed lid. Close a MacBook's lid with no external display attached and it sleeps, no matter what Battery says.

You have two options:

• Leave the lid open. Turn the brightness all the way down if the glow bothers you.
• Use clamshell mode. Plug in power AND an external display, then close the lid. With a display attached, the Mac keeps running.

Quick Fix Without Changing Settings

If you only need the Mac awake for a while (say, over a weekend), open Terminal and run:

caffeinate -s

caffeinate -s

The Mac stays awake on power for as long as that Terminal window is open. Press Control + C to stop it.

Still Stopping?

• Is AutoPrintEmail still running? Look for its icon in the menu bar. If you quit it, nothing prints. Turn on Start on login in its Settings so a restart doesn't stop it either.
• Is the printer asleep? Most printers wake up when a job arrives. If yours doesn't, check its own sleep or auto-off setting.
• Did a macOS update reset things? Big updates sometimes flip energy settings back. Check them again after upgrading.

Running AutoPrintEmail on a Windows PC too? Here's the Windows version of this guide.