How to fix the scroll wheel on your Apple mighty mouse

I love the scroll wheel on top of the Apple mighty mouse, but after a while the sweat and oil on your finger combined with grit and dust clogs the whole thing up. This manifests itself in the scroll wheel not scrolling down, or up, or in worst cases, not scrolling all. Here’s how to fix the problem.

I rang Apple and said my scroll wheel was not working and they gave me this simple but effective solution over the phone.

Simply take a sheet of clean white paper, put it on top of the mouse, and press down on the scroll wheel with your finger, but with the paper between your finger and the scroll wheel. Press quite hard with it and at the same time scroll around – moving it up and down and round and round. Move to a different area of the paper and give it another go.

The paper seems to absorb all the oil and gunk off the scroll wheel, and the scroll wheel in turn when it is clean must absorb the gunk off the sensors or whatever is underneath it.

I have found that a better method, especially with a dirty mouse, is to turn the mouse upside down and run the scroll-wheel in circles on a clean piece of paper until all the dirt comes off.

Make sure you use a brand new clean piece of paper.

Do not use alcohol. The rubber scroll wheel is sensitive and the alcohol is not needed.

No not use water. You don’t want water getting into the inside of your mouse!

It’s just dirty. It’s funny that I could not find this information anywhere on Google or on the Apple web page.

This clean paper trick works amazingly well.

Written by Wayne Connor
Mac user since 1996
Helping people master their Macs since 2005


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Comments

304 responses to “How to fix the scroll wheel on your Apple mighty mouse”

  1. APOLLON

    Perfect solution mine mighty mouse just worked I am so pleased
    thank y

  2. None

    MAGIC! Great suggestion … thanks for sharing!

  3. Rob

    Brilliant. Thanks so much for posting this solution. I had tried previously to fix and had given up. Put up with it for months with first not scrolling up and then not scrolling at all. Tried the paper trick and works perfectly now. Thanks

  4. Paul

    It works! Great tip, thanks.

  5. Henry

    Thanks for this. Even better is a piece of kitchen towel dampened with a little nail varnish remover, which, incidental, is a wonderful cleaner of keyboards, too.

    1. Henry

      Thanks for this. Even better is a piece of kitchen towel dampened with a little nail varnish remover, which, incidentally, is a wonderful cleaner of keyboards, too. ( without the typo)

      1. Henry, I would be hesitant to put nail varnish remover on because the wheel is made of rubber and I’m not sure what it will do long-term. I think nail varnish remover is acetone and I do know that acetone eats away at some rubber gloves.
        How long have you been using the nail varnish trick?

    2. I like using a little alcohol swab for cleaning my keyboard. You can buy a packet of 100 of them at the chemist or pharmacy fairly cheaply.

  6. David

    Perfect. Thanks for sharing that little tip :)

  7. vignesh

    Its simply awesome..its worked for me too:)

  8. Nick

    First reaction . . . Holy #*!–¶¢º¡Ã“Ø it worked! Thanks!

  9. Wolf Wallis

    Ah yes, the simplicity and beauty of the mac flows from the intelligent gathering and collaboration of ideas. This is a beautiful fix!

  10. Jean

    Amazing. Worked like a charm

  11. KUNALAN

    It works! Great tip, thanks.

  12. Malc

    Super tip. Worked like a dream. (Specifically when the mouse was turned upside down and run over paper). Thanks very much.

  13. sdsjhb

    it works!!!

  14. Nicholas

    I have to admit I was skeptical when I read this… Then I grabbed a notepad and rubbed the mouse wheel on it and BAM! Crisis averted. Nice call! Thanks for sharing.

  15. Kathryn

    Amazing! Worked so easily! And all the other places said you had to take it apart–which I KNEW I didn’t want to do!

  16. Klaas

    Great tip!

  17. David

    Rolled mouse upside down on paper. Problem solved. Thank you.

  18. Mohammad

    It worked really amazingly when I rolled mouse upside down and I saw dirts came off and started working. thanks

  19. Hanter

    Thanks. It really works :D

  20. WOW. That was amazing!

  21. Brilliant. I’d given up after checking all software related issues. This has fixed the verticle scroll, not horizontal, but still very useful.

    Thanks!

  22. gabriel

    It worked!!! Thanks for the tip! Should I clean the mouse generally every day-time?

    1. I just do it once a month or so when it slows down. I wouldn’t do it too much – might wear out the trackball!

  23. cglynn

    Wow! amazing what a sheet of clean paper can do! THANK YOU SO MUCH.

  24. Kara

    This just worked for me, even though my mouse is only a few weeks old! Thanks! Was going crazy searching for a technical reason online.

  25. Matus

    It worked. Saved the day. Thank you

  26. kap

    brilliant!!!! worked just as described—thanks-this should be on the apple website

  27. Um, WOW. This is so ridiculous. I’m laughing at how simple the solution was … I cannot believe how well this worked! I was literally just searching for a new mouse on Amazon and decided to give a quick search … you just saved me time and $$$!

  28. larry

    it worked! such an easy fix! thanks!

  29. Chris

    I am amazed at how many people find that this tip works, because it certainly hasn’t worked for me so all I can do is buy a new one :(

  30. Chris

    Actually I will now have to eat my words – after another good rolling, it does indeed work.

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