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Quick Look flickering on macOS 26.2

I have the same Quick Look symptoms as Dropbox Finder Integration Flickering on macOS 26.2, but with some stuble differences. My problem is persistent across restarts of Mac OS and the suggested fix did not work, nor are there any pending cloud syncs.

Integration Affected: Quick Look
Device: Mac Mini M2 Pro running macOS 26.2 (latest version). This started with Mac OS 26.0
Dropbox: Version 240.4.8493
Issue: Document displayed using QuickLook in Dropbox folders refreshes every second, disrupting file previews and navigation. If I scroll my PDF down in the quick look window, the refresh forces me back to the top of the document, if I am using QuickLook on an Excel spreadsheet, it always forces me back to the first sheet. This behaviour happens with all documents and images, not just PDF and XLSX.
Symptoms:

Quick Look resets to the first page/tab of all documents (PDF, Excel etc)
Unlike the other poster, my green Dropbox tick icons in Finder are constant (no flicker)

Steps to reproduce:

Open Dropbox folder in Finder, locate a document to QuickLook (PDF, XLSX, or anything really)

Steps to reproduce Secondary problems:

Select a multi‑page PDF and press space to preview.
Attempt to scroll to the second page.
Finder refreshes, preview resets to page one, and the Dropbox icon flickers.

It is impossible to productively use QuickLook on any file in Dropbox folders via Finder.

Thanks in advance!

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Comments

Megan

Hey @joehanna, thanks for posting here today!

How long has this been an issue for? Have you taken a look at this similar thread, and what the user mentioned there just to see if your problem remains the same?

If not, please give it a go and report back to me with the results.

Keep me posted!

joehanna

Thanks Megan. I did reference that thread in my post. My symptoms persist and the resolution did not work for me. The other difference I noted above is that it started with Mac OS 26.0

Walter

Hey @joehanna - could you try reinstalling the app on your computer and let us know if this persists?

joehanna

Thank you for jumping in on this Walter. I have tried reinstalling the app in the past and pointing it to the existing folder but it still syncs everything up and sometimes creates conflicts. I have almost 1.3TB of storage on Dropbox which I am hesitant to blow away and start again unless you can tell me it will definitely fix the problem. It takes days to resync as I do not use "Online only" settings - every file is fully synchronised with the cloud, some are gigabytes in size. I am basically out of action during this time.

Hannah

Thanks for your feedback here, @joehanna.

Can I ask, if you simply quit the Dropbox app, does the issue persist with the app closed?

Nancy

Hey @joehanna! Did you get the chance to try out Hannah’s suggestion perhaps?

Let us know, if it worked for you.

joehanna

Sorry for the late reply. I have been away for a few days. After returning, the problem has actually stopped. Nothing has changed, same Mac OS version, same Dropbox app version. This problem has been annoying me daily since installing 26.0 in September 2025 and now it has suddenly stopped. I can't explain it - and hopefully it doesn't come back as unexplained resolutions are never usually permanent.

Thank you to everyone that jumped in to help. I appreciate it very much! Hope you all enjoy your weekend!

Megan

Hey @joehanna, thanks for the heads up!

Keep an eye out for this, and if you need something else, please let me know and I will be more than happy to help every step of the way. 😇

roddrops

Hi @joehanna

I had the same problem.

Asking Claude about this issue, one of the solutions was deleting an (old?) Dropbox plugin:
~/Library/QuickLook/DropboxQL

This has fixed if for me. It's been several days without having to relaunch Finder.

Hope that's helpful!

joehanna

Incredible! It worked for me too! The problem was intermittent so it was difficult to nail down. It was too much effort to keep digging so I gave up and would open the document in Preview if it started to flicker.

Thank you @roddrops! I can now enjoy QuickLook on DropBox files again.

Hope you have a great weekend.

roddrops

Glad it helped! :-)

It was very annoying. Now it's been OK for about a week since I fixed it, and it hasn't returned.

Have a great weekend too!

roddrops

Unfortunately, the issue has returned for me. Bummer 😔

Dropbox updated to the latest version. MacOS updated to the latest 26.4 version.

Also using OneDrive. Even when quitting both file storage apps (OneDrive and Dropbox), the issue happens, in any folder (not only on the cloud storage folders). The problematic Quicklook plugin file is not there. Gets fixed when killing/relaunching Finder.

Megan

Hey @roddrops!

Sorry to hear you're facing the same issue again.

Based on the information provided, it appears this issue might not be related to Dropbox. If it were linked to our app (or OneDrive), the issue would likely cease once the application is closed.

Since the issue persists in folders outside of Dropbox, even when the app is quit, this leads me to believe the cause may be on Apple’s end. Have you contacted Apple support regarding this issue?