Fixing doas: not installed setuid on macOS (MacPorts)
Date: 2026-02-08
Host: macOS (MacPorts prefix: /opt/local)
Component: doas (MacPorts)
My WireGuard client app failed to load profiles because the code path relies on doas for privilege escalation. This fix corrects the macOS (MacPorts) doas installation so the client can elevate properly.
doas: not installed setuid
…and exiting with status 1.
Root Cause
On macOS, MacPorts installs doas without the setuid bit by default.
Because doas is not setuid-root, it cannot elevate privileges. Any command relying on it will immediately fail, including: