5 underappreciated macOS settings I take advantage of to energy up my MacBook

The historical past of macOS extends again many years, and Apple has been iterating on the working system year-over-year since its very inception. As such, the favored desktop OS has been endowed with a rising assortment of options, customization choices, and different helpful system instruments all through time.

A number of the settings discovered inside macOS are comparatively well-known, together with the choice to allow tabs in Finder, to regulate the scale and positioning of the Dock, and to tweak the aesthetics of the consumer interface. Hidden under the floor, nevertheless, are a set of extra obscure (and but extremely helpful) settings that each Mac proprietor ought to learn about.

Listed here are 5 underappreciated and underacknowledged settings inside macOS that I all the time make use of when powering up a MacBook or another Apple-made laptop.

5

Tiled home windows have margins

Profit from your monitor’s display screen actual property

On a contemporary set up of macOS, the ‘Tiled home windows have margins’ toggle is switched on by default. This setting provides a small quantity of padding round open software home windows which were positioned side-by-side, so as to give every interface room to breath. When you’re operating the OS on a big exterior show, then this feature is good to have, but it surely makes quite a bit much less sense on a cramped laptop computer display screen.

By unchecking this window margins setting, snapped home windows will show proper subsequent to at least one one other, with none of the padding. This lets you take full benefit of the restricted display screen actual property of a MacBook, with extra content material displayed on display screen and fewer of your wallpaper exhibiting by.

To take away the padding round tiled home windows, observe these steps:

1. Navigate to System Settings > Desktop & Dock.
2. From right here, merely toggle off Tiles home windows have margins.

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You will by no means need to open the Passwords app once more

With the discharge of macOS 15 Sequoia, Apple launched a standalone Passwords app. Quite than having to dig by System Settings to find and replace saved account credentials synced with iCloud, this new app streamlines the method enormously.

Lesser-known, nevertheless, is the hidden Passwords Menu Bar choice that may be enabled from inside the app itself. When toggled on, this provides a quick-access shortcut to all of your saved account usernames and passwords proper from the system’s predominant Menu Bar, whereas nonetheless sustaining a stage of safety through passcode or biometric unlock.

So as to add the Passwords shortcut to your Menu Bar, observe these steps:

1. Launch the Passwords app.
2. From the Menu Bar, click on on Passwords > Settings…
3. Right here, you will be prompted to enter your password or to authenticate biometrically.
4. As soon as in, test the Present Passwords in Menu Bar choice from inside the Passwords Settings window.

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3

Three finger trackpad drag

Drag round home windows and spotlight textual content with out lifting a finger

Throughout the PC area, Apple is understood for its glorious implementation of trackpad gestures. Owing to its top-down strategy throughout each software program and {hardware}, the corporate has been capable of craft a set of gestures that really feel silky easy, responsive, and pure.

Whereas mostly used gestures are enabled by default on a contemporary set up of macOS, one specifically is disabled: Use trackpad for dragging. This selection unlocks the ability to drag around open software home windows and to spotlight textual content through a triple-finger swiping gesture, versus counting on a press-and-drag movement. Other than being a helpful accessibility function, it feels surprisingly fluid to carry out this gesture in actual time — as soon as I bought used to it, I by no means appeared again.

To allow three finger dragging in your Mac trackpad, observe these steps:

1. Launch System Settings.
2. Navigate to Accessibility > Motor and click on on Pointer Management.
3. From right here, click on on the Trackpad Choices… button.
4. Toggle on Use trackpad for dragging, and choose Three Finger Drag from the Dragging fashion dropdown menu.

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2

Scorching Corners + Shift

Scorching Corners are nice, however this hidden tweak makes them even higher

Many macOS customers are already conversant in the Hot Corners feature, which helps you to arrange actions to happen when hovering your mouse cursor in direction of designated corners of the display screen. Lesser-known, nevertheless, is the power to complement Scorching Corners with a modifier key.

In my private expertise, I typically discover myself by chance triggering Scorching Corners after I do not imply to, which is the place this hidden tweak comes into play. It means that you can press down on one of many following keys when deciding on a fast motion: shift, ctrl, decide, and cmd. This fashion, by chance triggering Scorching Corners is prevented, with out having to resort to disabling the function in its entirety.

To configure Scorching Corners with modifier keys, observe these steps:

1. Launch the System Settings app.
2. Navigate to Desktop & Dock and click on on the Scorching Corners… button situated within the backside right-hand nook of the window.
3. A separate window will pop up, with 4 dropdown menus corresponding to every nook of your show.
4. When deciding on an motion from every dropdown menu, achieve this whereas holding down a modifier key.
5. Once you’re glad, click on on the Achieved button within the decrease right-hand nook.

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1

Spaced out Dock icons

A easy terminal command for digital group lovers

The Dock is a macOS staple, and its goal is multifunctional. It means that you can pin steadily used apps and folders to it, to attenuate lively home windows into miniature thumbnails, to entry the system’s Finder and Launchpad, and to tug undesirable information on to Trash.

Whereas Apple offers a number of out-of-box customization instruments to regulate the Dock to your liking (together with the power to resize and reposition it), there’s really a hidden customization instrument that I all the time make use of. By performing a easy Terminal command, you’ll be able to add ‘hidden’ icons to the Dock, which may then be repositioned or stacked subsequent to one another to create a way of visible hierarchy.

So as to add empty icon slots inside the Dock, observe these steps:

1. Launch the Terminal app from inside the Launchpad or from Finder > Purposes > Utilities.
2. Copy and paste this command into the Terminal window, after which press Enter: defaults write com.apple.dock persistent-apps -array-add ‘{“tile-type”=”small-spacer-tile”;}’; killall Dock
3. Each time you enter this command, a brand new clean icon will seem inside your Dock. From right here, you’ll be able to transfer it round similar to another app icon.
4. To take away an undesirable clean icon, merely drag it out of the Dock, and it’ll instantly disappear.

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