Mac OS Big Sur is laggy and sluggish

That's not my experience, nor most people's, I think. Big Sur should still work fine on Intel.

What vintage of MBP is it? Have you run something like Etrecheck over your system? The chances are you've got some old software that's launching background processes which don't play nicely with Big Sur. Or failing hardware!

OK, well first thing you should do is download EtreCheck from the Mac App Store, and run it. That will produce a report about your system: what third-party software is running in the background, any problems. It's a very useful diagnostic tool. You can post the results here: there's no personal info.

razieee, I'm running Big Sur on a 2015 MBP and while it isn't as fast as my 2020 iMac I don't notice sluggishness myself. It runs perfectly fine. How much RAM do you have and how much free space is on your disk?

Please look into Etrecheck, it will help us diagnose your issue. I would guess as benwiggy is suggesting that it is a software issue.

I hope this helps.

Paul

I can read it. OK there's lots of useful info here, but no obvious culprit.

You have lots of third-party software that has its 'teeth' in the OS. If it's not updated or compatible with Big Sur, it might be causing problems.

I'm immediately suspicious of DigiDNA, and Folx, neither of which I know. If Safari is being sluggish: remove third-party extensions. Also VPN Unlimited -- check that the software is compatible, or remove.

Get rid of SpeedTestHelper in your Login Items. You can test connection speeds without installing stuff.

You have enough free disk space, and 16 GB of RAM. Memory pressure might be a bit high.

I would launch Activity Monitor, and see if anything is hogging the CPU and Memory. Things do look a bit excessive - Notification Centre is running at 30%; "Other processes" are 51%. It has to be said that Chrome has a reputation as a CPU and Memory hog.

Also: I note you don't seem to be using Time Machine. I hope you have another backup strategy in place?

Have you tested a brand new user account, at the least? That's a quick way of ruling out the system as the cause. (Though third-party /Library/LaunchAgents will still run.)

I'm running Big Sur on a 2015 MacBook Pro and I'm finding it sluggish too. Guess Raziee and me are unlucky.

Dedicated GPU too? I'm running the 2014 15" MBP with Intel GPU and it seems fine.

No, I just get a blank screen.

Paul