Can't apply colour swatches in swatches pallette
Indesign version 20.0.1
Mac OS Sequoia 15.1.1
Steps:
1. Create or open a document
2. Create or select any text box or picture box
3. Select any colour in the Swatches panel
4. The colour swatch will hilite for a second when clicked, but then deselects and the colour is NOT applied to the object
5. Same is true for text: Cannot apply any colour to text using the Swatches panel.
6. Using the "Color" panel however does allow you to apply colours using CMYK or other spaces.
Additional Notes:
- Already tried manually deleting caches and preference files from user library
- Already tried command-option-control-shift while starting Indesign to delete preferences
- Rebooted Mac several times and also zapped PRAM
- Only started happening today (I think Indesign was auto-updated by CC)
Brad
shared this idea
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Brad
commented
OP here… confirmed, the solution works, it was indeed the app Magnet.
Thank you to Steve, Kevin, and Marko.
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Steve
commented
It looks like this was solved—it seems to be caused by a popular third-party Mac utility, Magnet (as stated by @Marko Damis). Disable it and you should be fine.
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Kevin M
commented
In addition to the swatch issue i had a problem where object selections were delayed by about 1–2 seconds then once the object/item was selected it would move them by a few pixels each time.
Reading @Marko Damis comments below regarding quitting the magnet app which ran in the background seems to have resolved the issue for me also.
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mofowax
commented
I have the same issue. I have tried InDesign 2023, 2024, and 2025 with no luck. Can you prioritise, please?!
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Marko Damis commented
Since everything worked for me in safe mode i started quiting other apps that run in background. For me the problem was with Magnet app, once I quit it all InDesign things started working again normally.
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I have the same issue with this version of InDesign. Clicking the swatch very quickly multiple times does apply the colour but is very buggy. Same goes with applying the font, only works with writing the full name of the font and pressing enter, "click selecting" the font does not work (furious clicking works).
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Dan Patching commented
Im having exactly the same issues as Brad and Steve, have tried all the suggestions too. This is clearly a critical bug within the app that needs addressing urgently!
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Steve
commented
I'm suddenly encountering the EXACT same issue this afternoon. Something is off. I uninstalled all of Creative Cloud, and then used the Creative Cloud cleaner tool—still it's an issue. I am also unable to change the font of a given text box. I can hover through the fonts dropdown, and see the live previews of different fonts on my selected text box—but the only way to apply the font is to furiously click and click about 10–12x. All other Adobe apps seem fine—it's an InDesign issue. It also stopped working in the previous verion, InDesign 2024, so perhaps it's a shared live component or service of some kind?