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  3. Device Management

Device Action: Restart Device

The Restart action remotely restarts a device. On iOS and tvOS, the restart occurs immediately without prompting the user. On macOS, additional options are available to notify the user or rebuild the kernel cache during the restart.

Apple documentation for the RestartDevice command can be found here:

Supported platforms

  • iOS / iPadOS: Requires iOS 10.3 or later. Device must be supervised.
  • macOS: Requires macOS 10.13.2 or later. Supervision is not required.
  • tvOS: Requires tvOS 10.2 or later. Device must be supervised.

This action is not available for visionOS devices or devices enrolled via User Enrollment.

How to restart a device

iOS / iPadOS / tvOS

  1. In SimpleMDM, navigate to the device's Device Details page.
  2. Click the "Actions" menu.
  3. Select "Restart".
  4. Confirm the restart when prompted.

The device will restart immediately without prompting the user.

macOS

  1. In SimpleMDM, navigate to the device's Device Details page.
  2. Click the "Actions" menu.
  3. Select "Restart".
  4. Configure the restart options as needed (see settings explained below).
  5. Click "Restart Devices" to send the command.

Restart settings explained (macOS)

The following options are available when restarting macOS devices:

  • Notify User: When set to "Yes", the user is prompted to restart the device at their convenience rather than being forced to restart immediately. The user can dismiss the notification. If no user is logged in, the device will restart immediately regardless of this setting. Requires macOS 11.3 or later.
  • Rebuild Kernel Cache: When set to "Yes", the system rebuilds the kernel cache during the restart. Requires macOS 11 or later. Rebuilding the kernel cache is useful after installing or updating kernel extensions (kexts) — for example, third-party drivers for peripherals, virtualization software, or security tools. The rebuilt cache ensures the new or updated kexts are loaded on the next boot. Hopefully most vendors have moved on from kernel extensions, which have been deprecated for years, and have adopted system extensions in their place - making this feature irrelevant.

Both options default to "No".

Notes

  • The device must be online to receive the restart command. If offline, the command will be queued and processed the next time the device checks in.
  • A passcode-locked iOS device may not rejoin Wi-Fi after restarting, which can prevent it from communicating with SimpleMDM until it is unlocked.
  • The Restart action can also be used as a bulk action from the Devices list to restart multiple devices at once.
Eric McCann
Updated
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