Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Technical & Gameplay Problems macOS Game freezes before/after cutscenes [Act 1]

I’m coming from PS5 and decided to try Baldur’s Gate 3 on macOS Tahoe, and it is completely unplayable. I see a lot of similar posts here, so I’m creating this one in the hope that Larian might notice it.

System / Setup:

- MacBook Pro with Apple M3 Pro Max, 36 GB RAM
- macOS Tahoe installed 26.2 (25C56)
- Around 500 GB of free SSD space and 1TB SSD total
- BG3 purchased through Steam
- Game files verified through Steam; Steam Cloud disabled
- In-game settings set to Medium where possible
- Display mode set to Borderless Window (FPS cannot be changed directly), FPS cap set to 60 both in game and via macOS (same result)
- Slow HDD mode enabled
- No mods installed; clean game and save
- Latest Steam version of the game as of today


This is a new playthrough, currently in Act 1. The game constantly freezes either right before or right after cutscenes. This happened in camp when trying to talk to someone, and when trying to enter the crypt with the dead.

Basically, when you click to interact, the game freezes and shows the macOS “rainbow” spinning circle, and the only option is to Force Quit the game. This does not appear to be a memory issue as Activity Monitor shows only around 12 GB of RAM in use.

These bugs were somewhat manageable. To work around them, I had to wait about 10 seconds before interacting with camp members or the crypt door.

However, there is a critical bug that completely blocks progression. When you reach the tiefling grove and see the cutscene of goblins attacking the grove, the fight starts. Once all goblins are defeated, the game freezes and the only option is to Force Quit. This time, I can’t control the “wait 10 seconds” workaround because it happens immediately after the cutscene.

I’ve tried this fight about five times, attempting various things such as stopping BG3 from being indexed by macOS Spotlight and disabling ESET protection, but nothing helps. I’m completely stuck and cannot progress any further.

I started looking for people with similar issues and found many recent posts here from other users.

Larian, please check this bug and fix it.
Thanks!

Same here! I get these crashes even when there are no other applications running, including menu bar apps. I have 'Keep Downloaded' ticked on the Larian Studios directory in ~/Documents. Happy to share crashlogs.

Same here!

The game was running completely fine before updating to macOS Tahoe 26.2, but now it's unplayable.

I have a run where I am in Act 3, after
Every time I start a conversation with an NPC where I have dialogue options, the game freezes. The only solution is to quit the game through Steam.
Initially, I thought it could have been a damaged save file. I then loaded some old save files, but the problem is still there.
I even started a new campaign. I had the same problem right before
I somehow managed to go through, but now the same happens when I interact with the crypt.

Please Larian help us!