Why your Mac wakes up from sleep by itself

Read the wake log

1. 1Open Terminal from Applications › Utilities.
2. 2Run pmset -g log | grep -E "Wake from|DarkWake". Each line is one wake, oldest first.
3. 3Look at the words after due to, near the end of the line: lid or HID Activity means you; rtc/… means a timer; wifibt means the network.
4. 4Run pmset -g log | grep "Wake Requests" | tail -1 to see which processes asked to wake the Mac the last time it went to sleep.
5. 5For network wakes, set Wake for network access to Never in System Settings › Battery › Options (on a desktop, turn it off in Energy).

pmset -g log | grep -E "Wake from|DarkWake"

An afternoon on our MacBook Pro, lid closed and on battery (shortened):

2026-11-11 13:58:39 +0200 DarkWake             DarkWake from Deep Idle [CDNP] : due to NUB.SPMI0Sw3IRQ nub-spmi0.0x02 rtc/Maintenance Using BATT (Charge:100%) 5 secs
2026-11-11 14:05:53 +0200 DarkWake             DarkWake from Deep Idle [CDNP] : due to NUB.SPMI0Sw3IRQ nub-spmi0.0x02 rtc/Maintenance Using BATT (Charge:100%) 6 secs
2026-11-11 14:20:25 +0200 DarkWake             DarkWake from Deep Idle [CDNP] : due to smc.sysState.Wake(0x70070000) wifibt SMC.OutboxNotEmpty centauri-alpha E_TKO_TCP_DATA ARPT/ Using BATT (Charge:100%) 30 secs
2026-11-11 14:38:16 +0200 DarkWake             DarkWake from Deep Idle [CDNP] : due to NUB.SPMI0Sw3IRQ nub-spmi0.0x02 rtc/SleepService Using BATT (Charge:100%) 2 secs
2026-11-11 14:55:50 +0200 DarkWake             DarkWake from Deep Idle [CDNP] : due to NUB.SPMI0Sw3IRQ nub-spmi0.0x02 rtc/SleepService Using BATT (Charge:100%) 2 secs
…
2026-11-11 16:46:45 +0200 Wake                 Wake from Deep Idle [CDNVA] : due to smc.sysState.Wake(0x70070000) lid SMC.OutboxNotEmpty RTP.multi-touch/HID Activity Using BATT (Charge:100%)

Each line gives the time, the kind of wake, the reason after “due to”, the power source with the battery level, and for dark wakes how long the Mac stayed up. The letters in square brackets and the hardware names before the reason (NUB.SPMI0Sw3IRQ, smc.sysState.Wake) are lower-level details; you can skip them. For a summary, pmset -g stats printed Sleep Count 13, Dark Wake Count 12, User Wake Count 1 since the last startup.

What the reasons mean

The reasons we saw that afternoon, and how often:

During each of these dark wakes the log also opened a “SleepService” window with “cap time=180 secs”, and the Mac went back to sleep well before that.

The reasons depend on the Mac and macOS version. Yours may show others; the words after “due to” usually name the part that woke it.

Who asked for the wake

Timer wakes are requested by processes. Each time the Mac goes to sleep, the log lists every wake that’s been requested:

pmset -g log | grep "Wake Requests" | tail -1

On our Mac (one request per line; we added the line breaks):

2026-11-11 16:46:06 +0200 Wake Requests
  [process=dasd request=SleepService deltaSecs=928 wakeAt=2026-11-11 17:01:35 info="com.apple.dasd:501:com.apple.intelligenceflow.toolbox.update.fastpass"]
  [process=mDNSResponder request=Maintenance deltaSecs=6477 wakeAt=2026-11-11 18:34:03 info="DHCP lease renewal"]
  [process=powerd request=TCPKATurnOff deltaSecs=306651 wakeAt=2026-11-15 05:56:57]
  [*process=powerd request=CSPNEvaluation deltaSecs=706 wakeAt=2026-11-11 16:57:53]
  [process=powerd request=UserWake deltaSecs=9801 wakeAt=2026-11-11 19:29:28 info="com.apple.alarm.user-invisible-com.apple.calaccessd.travelEngine.periodicRefreshTimer,797"]

process is who asked, request the kind, wakeAt when, and info what for. The entry marked with * is the soonest one. Here mDNSResponder wanted to wake the Mac for a “DHCP lease renewal” of its network address, and a timer from calaccessd had a wake booked for 19:29. Wakes booked ahead also show up here:

pmset -g sched

Scheduled power events:
 [0]  wake at 11/11/2026 19:29:28 by 'com.apple.alarm.user-invisible-com.apple.calaccessd.travelEngine.periodicRefreshTimer'
 [1]  wake at 11/12/2026 01:56:55 by 'com.apple.alarm.user-invisible-com.apple.osanalytics.hardhighengagementtimer'
 [2]  wake at 11/12/2026 01:59:44 by 'com.apple.alarm.user-invisible-com.apple.osanalytics.hardhighengagementtimer'

Stop the wakes you don’t want

Network wakes. Wake for network access lets other devices wake your Mac to use what it shares, and makes the Mac wake at regular intervals to announce those resources. On a Mac laptop: System Settings › Battery › Options › Wake for network access › Never. On a desktop: System Settings › Energy, turn off Wake for network access. In pmset -g it’s the womp line.

Sharing. Apple suggests turning off sharing services you don’t need in System Settings › General › Sharing, such as file or printer sharing.

Power Nap. It lets a sleeping Mac check Mail and update Calendar and iCloud events, and on a power adapter download software updates and make Time Machine backups. Apple’s macOS Tahoe guide puts the switch in System Settings › Battery › Options › Enable Power Nap; not every Mac shows it. pmset -g shows it as powernap.

Accessories. Apple lists unexpected key presses or clicks and malfunctioning USB or Thunderbolt devices among the causes of unexpected wakes. Unplug them, then reconnect one at a time.

Apple notes that preventing sleep, or letting it be interrupted, can increase power use, and that some options aren’t available on every Mac.

In SleepPilot

SleepPilot (Mac App Store) shows the wakes it saw in its Last night report, next to how long the Mac was asleep, how long it was awake while nobody used it, which apps kept it awake and how much the battery changed. The report covers the time SleepPilot was running. It doesn’t change wake settings; use System Settings for that.