File icons not appearing since upgrading to MacOS Ventura

[Gary King]

Since I upgraded to MacOS Ventura, icons for files like .mp4 and .doc in Alfred do not appear.

 

I've attached screenshots showing how an .mp4 file does not have an icon in Alfred, but has the VLC icon in Finder.

 

How can I get the icons to appear for all file types, including video files, in Alfred?

[vitor]

It’s a Ventura bug. Some of my file types are also affected but it’s not just Alfred, they don’t show up in Spotlight either. Found several reports of this on the web, outside of Alfred results:

• Blank File Icons in Ventura
• Generic Attachment icons in Outlook email after Ventura install
• When does the Icon Cache clear itself?
• Ventura issue rendering custom document icons

This needs to be reported to Apple via the Feedback Assistant app. The more people do it, the likelier it is to get fixed. A clean install might take care of it.

 

Edited December 24, 2022 by vitor

[Tubby]

Just bought a new MacBook with Ventura pre-installed and currently encountering this exact problem.

[sepulchra]

Unfortunately this is a Ventura bug whether one has upgraded to Ventura or received a brand new machine with it pre-installed. In fact, I see this more on a new machine that had Ventura pre-installed vs a machine where I upgraded the OS. 

[xilopaint]

Can anyone confirm whether the bug persists in Ventura? My PDF custom icons are not being displayed as well.

 

Btw, I noticed the issue after installing Skim and changing the filetype association. Perhaps the bug can be related to Ventura not handling properly filetype association changes.

Edited April 17, 2023 by xilopaint

[Tubby]

Yes I have a new MacBook that came pre-installed with Ventura and this issue persists to this day.

[Stephen_C]

I also confirm I see the same.

 

Stephen

[xilopaint]

@EricCartman @Stephen_C

 

Do you guys also have the issue with PDF or just other filetypes?

[vitor]

Yes, custom document icons are specifically a problem (see the last link from my list above) but that’s not all. I don’t have an issue with PDF icons but I do have it with PNGs. Both of those open with Preview.

[xilopaint]

21 minutes ago, vitor said:

Yes, custom document icons are specifically a problem (see the last link from my list above) but that’s not all. I don’t have an issue with PDF icons but I do have it with PNGs. Both of those open with Preview.

 

Do you remember changing PNG filetype association anytime in the past?

Edited April 17, 2023 by xilopaint

[vitor]

No, I am absolutely certain I haven’t done that. Again, those are affected but not the cause. It would be clear by now if they were. I also have media types which don’t show the icons and others who do, and they are associated with the same third-party app which uses the same document icon regardless of file type. Furthermore there are multiple reports, including in this thread, of a clean install having the broken icons. Any way you look at it points to it being a macOS bug which has to be fixed by Apple.

[Stephen_C]

7 hours ago, xilopaint said:

 

Do you guys also have the issue with PDF or just other filetypes?

For me it's definitely a more general problem with file icons.

 

Stephen

[DJW]

I am running the latest versions of Alfred (5.0.6) and MacOS Ventura (13.2.1).  I run the same versions on two machines - one a MacBook and one a Mac Studio.  Both came installed with Ventura.   Both are M2 chips, for what it's worth. On the Studio, everything works fine.  When doing an Alfred search on the MacBook, I am missing the icons for .xlsx files and a few other file types.  (note, the same file saved as an XLS instead of an XLSX works fine).  Alfred finds the files just fine, but doesn't display the icon. If it were a Ventura bug, as has been mentioned above,  I would think I'd have the issue on both machines.  Also, there is no issue with Spotlight showing all the icons on either machine.    This had been really frustrating.

[vitor]

5 hours ago, DJW said:

If it were a Ventura bug, as has been mentioned above,  I would think I'd have the issue on both machines.

Part of the bug is the inconsistency. Everyone has slightly different behaviour. If the bug were reliably reproducible we’d have better clues.

 

See the links above, this is happening in multiple apps, which haven’t made any changes, only on Ventura. And it’s not documented by Apple as a purposeful behaviour change nor is there a clear path provided.

 

5 hours ago, DJW said:

Also, there is no issue with Spotlight showing all the icons on either machine.

Luck of the draw. I’ve confirmed it not working in Spotlight in several installations, including Virtual Machines, with different behaviours. This is also linked above with links to sources.

 

Edited April 23, 2023 by vitor

[xilopaint]

The issue has been fixed on macOS 13.4.

[Tubby]

35 minutes ago, xilopaint said:

The issue has been fixed on macOS 13.4.

 

Just updated to 13.4 and looks like it indeed has been fixed!

[vitor]

Finally! I can attest it has also been fixed for me. But it wasn’t immediate. I saw the MP4 icon be fixed “in real time” (checked repeatedly; one moment it wasn’t there then it was) but PNGs stayed blank. Tried a few things (making new ones, opening them) and still nothing. Finally I did a metadata reindex and it was fixed (it may have been a coincidence and it would have happened by waiting longer).

[DJW]

I just upgraded to 13.4 and I can say it is fixed for me as well.  Finally!