But a cluttered Desktop can seriously slow down your Mac, according to Lifehacker. The files and folders on your Desktop take up a lot more system resources than you may realize due to the way OS X's graphical system works. Fact: an overused Desktop can seriously slow down your Mac!

Does having stuff on your Desktop slow it down Mac?

The tool is always ready with previews, so when you have a lot of documents on the Desktop, all those previews will have to be temporarily stored in the RAM. This means your Mac can become extremely slow.

Does a cluttered Desktop slow a computer?

A cluttered desktop makes things disorganized and hard to find, but it can also slow computers down. The purpose of the desktop is to be interactive, not to store files. ... If you have a large number of files on your desktop, it is slowing down your computer. Those files need to be reorganized in your other folders.