I'm having the same issue with a late 2015 Mac running the latest Mojave and InDesign releases. It makes working with InDesign very frustrating to nigh impossible. I might try adjusting the refresh rate as recommended by other users, but would strongly prefer an official solution from Adobe and Apple, rather than having to use 3rd party tools to mess with my system settings in the hopes of *potentially* fixing the issue..

I have the same issue using an external 4k screen (60 Hz) connected on my MacBook Pro 2015. Strangely I tried to reproduce this issue in Illustrator and everything worked fine in this application. So, are you sure the bug comes from Apple's side ?

If connected by Thunderbolt/MiniDisplay port (60 Hz), the screen will loose the sync with the Macbook during 1-2 sec while moving a simple rectangle or ellipse in InDesign.

If connected by HDMI (30 Hz), while doing the same test, the picture will suffer a brief distortion but will not turn black.

VERY IMPORTANT : When I close the Macbook, the problem disappears. When I open it again, it appears again.

InDesign 14.0.2
Mojave 10.14.5

Hi.

MacBook Pro + 4K monitor. Everything was okay in 30Hz, and in fact, changing to 60Hz is the problem.

My question is: does 60Hz really make any difference in Indesign? I've made some tests and seems to be the same thing, but maybe I'm too dumb to see the difference.

Thanks,
Luiz

@RY, read my comments below, I fixed it by adjusting my refresh rate to 30Hz on the 4k external display.

Try SwitchResX and choose a 30Hz version of your resolution.

InDesign 14.0.2
Mac Pro (late 2013)
Quad-Core Intel Xeon E5 3.7 GHz
32 GB RAM
2x AMD FirePro D700 6144 MB GPU
LG ULTRAWIDE:
Resolution: 3440 x 1440 (UWQHD - Ultra-Wide Quad HD)
UI Looks like: 3440 x 1440 @ 60 Hz
Thunderbolt

Cintiq 27QHDT:
Resolution: 2560 x 1440 (QHD/WQHD - Wide Quad High Definition)
UI Looks like: 2560 x 1440 @ 60 Hz
Thunderbolt

I can capture this behavior in a screen recording, and I have attached the video.

This behavior becomes quite strobe like in some situations.

—Using 30Hz is not an option

I turned all my display preferences back to max and GPU on with object-level display mode on too :)

My Preferred resolution is 1080p@30Hz (HiDPI mode - 4k scaled to 1080p, meaning every logical pixel now has 4 physical pixels behind it to get that Retina smooth look) now so I don't get the flashing screen.

My iGPU spec is also there too. Mojave 10.14.4. It's a maxed out 13" MacBook Pro 2015 model. :)

I was using Adobe InDesign CC 2014 (ver 10.0.0.70) for so long on my old Mac because I had so many issues with 2019 on my new Mac like this Gujarati Sangam MN font word spacing issue, because CC 2019 uses a new layout rendering engine, but same .indd file type, sneaky Adobe https://forums.adobe.com/thread/2617540).

Hey guys,

So after contacting useless Apple and Adobe support chats, I was left to solve it on my own, if there was ever going to be an immediate fix. I noticed this issue was definitely GPU/CPU related in the way it was outputting visuals to the screen and I had similar issues years ago with Xbox 360 being incompatible with 50Hz TVs and would require 60Hz TVs.

SOLUTION: Download SwitchResX (It's a trusted program I've used since 2014, it allows you to manually adjust the screen resolution AND REFRESH RATE). https://www.madrau.com/srx_download/download.html

I remember my old 13" MacBook Pro 2013 was only capable of 30Hz 4k output which explains why it never received this flashing black screen issue.

So all had to do was adjust my refresh rate to be at 30Hz on 4k resolutions or use a lower resolution on my new 2015 13" MacBook Pro. (The more refresh rate, the more memory required to process the visual we see on the screen, it makes total sense why Adobe would reach the vRAM limit since it's an intense program and 4k externals use up WAY more vRAM in order to power two displays at once, and 4k is no easy feature to power even though it looks easy for today's Macs. - I remember researching this heavily before I bought my first MacBook Pro in 2014 because I wanted a 4k external display to be Retina like.

I'd be curious to know if dGPU Macs also have this issue, I think I read some comments saying yes... Any how Adobe should definitely cap the refresh rate to 30Hz on 4k setups if this is the only fix or at least tell their users.

I'll blog about this issue shortly. :) I tested multiple non HiDPI and HiDPI (4k) at 30Hz resolutions here and wasn't getting the flashing screen issue anymore when moving objects in InDesign:

Just sent Adobe logs too via their log tool or it will come via email. https://helpx.adobe.com/creative-cloud/kb/cc-log-collector.html?source=accc&mv=product&mv2=accc#

I will try restarting my Mac but not hopeful. Contacted Apple Support, they recommended Safe Mode boot by holding down shift key... https://support.apple.com/en-au/HT201262

Just to reiterate, this doesn't seem to happen on the in-built Mac screen if I put InDesign on there.

Maybe also, trying a fresh install or under a new Mac user might help? I heard Adobe Illustrator doesn't even run on the Surface Book 2 hah what?! https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/surface/forum/all/surface-book-2-cant-deal-with-adobe-indesign/d7e177ff-bad7-4bc7-9a41-618076dc555d?auth=1

Logs from system.log if this helps soon after it happened:

https://gist.github.com/stefancaliaro/c0c6ea25f383d0fef8f4a622a23f3e87

Seems to be affecting both CPU and GPU previews, even though my 13" Macbook Pro 2015 Mojave just has iGPU Intel Iris 6100. Please fix this Adobe, seems to be affecting only 4k external displays from reading around... they take more memory to display, seems like some kind of video limit is being reached causing the GPU/CPU to resent the visual external display each time.

Curious if this is also happening on Windows version, if we can run it on Parallels VM? My guess is it doesn't?

Has Adobe even looked at this issue yet? v14.0.2 and I basically can't work in InDesign 2019. It's unusable on multiple fronts, this black flashing issue upon nearly every option move (except when you CMD-Z or use keyboard arrow keys to move an object. I noticed the black screen flashing seems to only happen when dragging and dropping an object... Man Adobe really needs to get onto this, they need to hire more good quality software engineers and QA Testers, christ. I recorded it here again: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UhYoDoOdeqc Dell P2415Q 4k display. I tried turning down the quality to fastest but still same issue... wtf :( Maybe Intel driver issue but we have no say on Mac?

I've NEVER had this issue running Adobe InDesign 2014 v10.0.70 on my Yosemite 10.10.5 with same screen hardware but 2013 13" MacBook Pro.

Same thing here, seriously wtf Adobe?! I've already had another font issue with Gujarati Sangam MN having zero spacing in 2019 ver. https://indesign.uservoice.com/forums/601180-adobe-indesign-bugs/suggestions/37487995-no-font-spacing-between-words-in-indesign-2019-14

And now this: :( So poor form Adobe, seriously get this fixed ASAP. Dell 4k monitor P2415Q 3840x2160 @ 60Hz https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UhYoDoOdeqc

Fix your stuff! macOS Mojave 10.14.4, MacBook Pro 13" 2015. iGPU Intel Iris 6100 1536MB vRAM, 16GB RAM, 3.1GHz i7 CPU, 512GB SSD.

Started happening when I upgraded from my 2013 Mac Mini to the 2018.

There are tons of people how have reported this issue on the web. The hack of changing cursor size in accessibility does work, but then the flashing happens in Acrobat.
https://forums.adobe.com/thread/1994243?start=40&tstart=0
https://forums.adobe.com/thread/2228209
https://forums.adobe.com/thread/2233660
https://forums.adobe.com/message/8347403#8347403

Screen drops out and goes black whenever I move primary text frame with text inside. Text has a paragraph style with "Align all lines to baseline grid" turned on.

Running InDesign 2019 on a 2018 MacMini, Samsung U32J59x 4K UHD monitor connected via HDMI 2 cable.

Need a resolution for this problem - (excuse the pun)

Same thing happens to me after connecting Dell U2718Q 4K monitor to my Macbook Pro 13" Retina (2015).

macOS 10.14.1
2,7 GHz Inter Core i5
8 GB 1867 MHz DDR3
Inter Iris Graphics 6100 1536 MB