Disable Bonjour by Turning Off mDNSResponder
Bonjour is a great service that runs in the background of your Mac to auto-discover network resources, that is, it’s great until mDNSResponder goes haywire. I was recently in a very creatively crafted network environment that made Bonjour absolutely freak out and tax my CPU with a million processes, so I opted to just disable the service temporarily.
Generally speaking you should leave Bonjour enabled since it’s functionality is ubiquitously used throughout Mac OS X, but if you DO want to disable mDNSResponder, here’s how to do it:
How to Turn Off mDNSResponder by Disabling Bonjour in Mac OS X
Launch the terminal and type:
sudo launchctl unload -w /System/Library/LaunchDaemons/com.apple.mDNSResponder.plist
This unloads the mdnsresponder launchdaemon from launchctl, of course that can be reversed with another command, if need be.
Turn on Bonjour aka mDNSResponder in Mac OS
To reenable Bonjour simply type the following to reload the mDNSResponder daemon:
sudo launchctl load -w /System/Library/LaunchDaemons/com.apple.mDNSResponder.plist
Both of these commands to enable or disable Bonjour will require your administrator password to execute as root, hence the use of sudo.
This is obviously for advanced Mac users who know enough about mDNSResponder and Bonjour to want to adjust the functionality, but most Mac users should never mess with this stuff.
See https://osxdaily.com/2015/10/05/disable-rootless-system-integrity-protection-mac-os-x/ for disabling SIP
This no longer works. When you enter the command in Terminal you get this reponse-Operation not permitted while System Integrity Protection is engaged. How you disable SIP I don’t know but Apple introduced this so you couldn’t disable stuff they did not want you to.
Same problem as Janvier: If I use the given terminal command to disable Bonjour, my computer can no longer access the internet. I’ve never thought that Apple use this way to force user getting involve in their iTunes services.
Happened the same problem of Paul and Janvier.
Couldn’t connect to the internet anymore.
After I originally left a comment I seem to have clicked on the -Notify me when new comments are
added- checkbox and now each time a comment is added I
get four emails with the exact same comment.
Is there an easy method you can remove me from that service?
Thanks!
Doing this breaks iTunes.
[…] and work seamlessly together on your local network. To disable the service have a look at this: Disable Bonjour by turning off mDNSResponder – OS X Daily Just remember that some network services you may be used to being available will no longer […]
Same problem as Janvier: If I use the given terminal command to disable Bonjour, my computer can no longer access the internet.
I tried this and couldn’t access the web anymore..
YMMV. I tried this a while back and it disabled all name resolution period – It seems like mDNSResponder handles dhcp addy acquisition and renewals. If you go down this route you might consider renewing your dhcp lease to see if it still works…
Would this fix my DNS issue I have when I connect to a Windows VPN but cannot ping/VNC to PC’s by computer name?