A Mac laptop equipped with Apple silicon is designed to power on automatically upon opening lid or connecting to a power source. However, for those running macOS Sequoia 15 or later, this behaviour can be modified without compromising the functionality of the keyboard or trackpad to manually power on the device.
TL:DR – Theres a new command to adjust this behaviour by you'll need Sequoia to use it.
Steps to prevent a Mac Laptop from Powering On When Opening the Lid or Connecting to Power
Ensure your Apple silicon Mac is updated to macOS Sequoia or a later version.
Launch the Terminal application, located within the Utilities folder of your Applications directory.
Enter one of the following commands into Terminal, followed by pressing Return:
- To disable startup when opening the lid or connecting to power:
sudo nvram BootPreference=%00
- To disable startup only when opening the lid:
sudo nvram BootPreference=%01
- To disable startup only when connecting to power:
sudo nvram BootPreference=%02
When prompted, input your administrator password (Terminal will not display the password as you type), then press Return.
To revert any of these changes and restore the default behaviour of automatic startup, execute the following command in Terminal:
sudo nvram -d BootPreference.
