I've got a mid-2011 MacBook Air that I've never had any problems running the Steam client on, or even playing various games on. Beginning this week, the app has started to crash multiple times a day. I can't narrow down what exactly is causing this...it has crashed when the computer is idling, when I'm chatting with someone, browsing the store...it seems random. Sometimes I can't go five minutes without a crash, and other times (like now) I can have Steam running for hours, use it as normal, and no crashes.

I deleted the app and reinstalled it and the problem is still happening. Opted back out of any betas just in case, but that didn't help. Searching through the web and the Steam forums was of no help, there are some general crash reports but nothing specific that I can find. As far as the machine itself goes, there are no other issues with it that I know of and I'm not running anything new compared to last week, and as far as I know there haven't been any major updates that could be causing a conflict.

Does anyone have any experience with the Steam app for Mac crashing like this, or how I may be able to fix it? Thanks!

Same problem over here. No idea why. Good to know there are others.

I am logged into the Mac Steam app right now (to get the Dungeon Defenders update) and it seems fine to me. I wish I could be more help. It could be anything like Flash (Steam does it use it) or some other external but related software that is causing the problem.

@Sparkul: I think I found a solution on the Steam forums. Someone said that the store page has a memory leak related to the rotating ads for games on sale on the front page. Temporary fix, which is working so far, is to change the default page of Steam to something other than the Store. Restart Steam, and as long as you don't visit the store, it won't crash. If you do have to go to the store, you will have to restart Steam and then stay away from the store otherwise it will eventually crash again.

I've had Steam up for about an hour without any crashes after starting this procedure. It's better than nothing until Valve releases an update to the Mac client, I guess.

@MB: Cool! I use the store in a better web browser anyway!

@MB said:

@Sparkul: I think I found a solution on the Steam forums. Someone said that the store page has a memory leak related to the rotating ads for games on sale on the front page. Temporary fix, which is working so far, is to change the default page of Steam to something other than the Store. Restart Steam, and as long as you don't visit the store, it won't crash. If you do have to go to the store, you will have to restart Steam and then stay away from the store otherwise it will eventually crash again.

I've had Steam up for about an hour without any crashes after starting this procedure. It's better than nothing until Valve releases an update to the Mac client, I guess.

Makes sense cuz I noticed that Steam was crashing non-stop too on my 2012 Air. I'm not worried though if that issue will most likely go away once the sale is over.

Wow, that's a really strange bug. Have they fixed it yet? (since this is almost a day old now)