10 Actually Useful Siri Commands To Use On Your Mac

Learn 10 Siri commands for your Mac that may be faster than doing the same thing using the cursor and keyboard. You can open folders and files, get answers to calculation, schedule events and set reminders, and send messages or emails.

Video Transcript: Hi, this is Gary with MacMost.com. Today let's look at some practical uses for Siri on your Mac.
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So I know a lot of people don't find Siri actually useful on their Mac. But there are some practical applications. Some things that you could do with Siri that actually save you some time. So let's take a look at ten Siri commands that you can really use.
Now first, to use Siri on your Mac go to System Preferences and then go to Siri and there checkout what your keyboard shortcut is. By default it's Hold Command Space. A Quick Command Space brings up Spotlight but holding Command Space will bring up Siri. But you could change it to some other things or you can customize and set your own shortcut. Now depending upon which Mac you've got, like if you have a newer MacBook, you may also have the option here to activate Siri with your voice. So you can do that as well.
So first I want to show you how you can open a folder using Siri. If I go in the Finder here and go to my documents folder. Then look in Work Project I've got folders like Project Alpha, Project Beta and Project Gamma. But instead of having to do all of that I can just ask Siri to open that folder. So I'll use the keyboard shortcut and then ask Siri to do it for me. Open folder project alpha. Siri says, Here you go. 
Now you can do the same thing with files. So notice here in my Work Projects folder I've got something called Daily Projects Journal. So I could just go right to that file and have it open up in its default app. Open file daily project journal. Siri says, Here you go. Now there are always alternatives. So for instance instead of saying file I could say my and it kind of knows what I'm doing. Open my daily project journal. Siri says, Here's what I got. Now, of course, you can also use Siri to launch apps. It's pretty easy to launch apps from the Dock. You could also use Spotlight. But sometimes Siri might be a little bit faster. Launch TextEdit. 
Now you can use a lot of the productivity apps on your Mac directly through Siri. This can be faster than actually doing it in the app. For instance if I wanted to add a new calendar event I'd have to launch Calendar and have to go to the day I wanted and I'd have to double click in there, create a new event and set everything. But I could just have Siri do it. I don't even have to have the Calendar app launched to do it.  Set up a meeting with John tomorrow at 3:00. Siri says, Okay I set up your meeting with John Smith for tomorrow. Ready to schedule it? Yes. Siri says, your meeting with John Smith is scheduled for tomorrow from 3 p.m. to 4 p.m. You can even ask Siri to alter events like this. Change my meeting with John to 4. Siri says, your appointment called meeting will be tomorrow from 4 p.m. to 5 p.m. Ready to update it?
Notice I'm still not running the Calendar app. It's even easier with Reminders. It doesn't as you to confirm. So I could do something like this, Remind me to take out the trash tonight at 6 o'clock. Siri says, Done. You can see how it just added it to it right there. You could also just add something to the list. So I have a grocery list. I can add to that. Add cookies to my grocery list. Siri says, Done. Notice I'm still not running the Reminders app. I never even had to bother to launch it.But if I do I could see there is take out the trash that was added. If I go to groceries I could see cookies have been added. 
You can also communicate directly with people without having to use the Messages or email apps. So for instance in Messages I could say something like, send a message to John that I'll be delayed. Siri says, Here's your message. Ready to send it? You could do the same thing with a whole email message. Send an email to John about tomorrow's meeting. Siri says, What would you like your email to say? Just remember to bring all the documentation.Thanks. Siri says, Here's your message to John Smith. 
So you can see there since I said about it took the rest of it to be the subject. Otherwise if I just said send an email to John Smith it would prompt me for the subject and then for the body of the message. Now notice the whole time I'm not even running the Mail app.
One of the things I use Siri for often is to do calculations. Usually I'm in the middle of doing something, I'm coding or working in the Graphics app, and need a quick calculation. I don't want to switch apps for that. I'll just ask Siri for something. What's 7263 divided by 7. Siri says, It's about  1037.5714. You could also do conversions. How many kilometers in ten miles. Siri says, The answer is 16.09 kilometers.
So remember when you were young in school and you first started to use the dictionary and they told you you could look up words to see how to spell them and you thought if I don't know how to spell them how can I look them up in the dictionary. Well, thanks to Siri you don't need to know how to spell a word to actually get the spelling. You could just ask using your voice. How do you spell precocious. Siri says, Precocious p r e. Notice it also brings up the dictionary definitions. You can as Siri to get definitions as well without having to look in the dictionary. Just ask Siri to define and then the word.
I like to listen to music while I'm working and you can have Siri actually play DJ. You don't have to go and dig in the Music app and find things. It works great if you have Apple Music because you can ask Siri to play anything in Apple Music. But if also works if you have your own library. So you should have the Music app launched in order to do this but if not Siri will prompt you for that. Play Drive My Car.
So here are a couple of bonuses that I can't demonstrate for you for obvious reasons. The first is you can use Siri to put your Mac to sleep. Now if you ask Siri to go to sleep you'll just get a snarky reply. But if you say Mac Sleep it works. You can also go to the screensaver by saying Activate the Screensaver or just screensaver and it works. 
Now a few more tips here on using Siri. One is in System Preferences here if you don't want Siri to actually respond audibly to what you're saying you can turn Off Voice Feedback. This speeds things up a little bit and you don't always need Siri to respond when I can see Siri is actually doing the thing I asked. Also if you want to see what else Siri can do just activate Siri but instead of saying something wait and then you'll see this Help come up. You can dig down into any of these categories and see what else Siri can do.

Comments: 6 Responses to “10 Actually Useful Siri Commands To Use On Your Mac”

Robert Hiday

4 years ago

This is great stuff Gary! Very helpful. I have been using Siri to a large extent or all of my devices, including my MacBook but this expands out even more and I am grateful.

Toni Smith

When I tell Siri to open a folder it. comes back with a message saying
SiriSNCis not permitted to do that

Tom Gonser

Although my iMac Preferences is set to open Siri by "holding" command + space, it works only sometimes. Most of the time it briefly opens the desktop file that happens to be at the bottom of the first column of desktop icons. I can of course find the cursor and move it to the Siri icon at top right of the screen. But less convenient. Really liked your Siri tips - but it would be ever so much more useful if the keyboard shortcut worked reliably. Any hints?

Gary Rosenzweig

Tom: That almost sounds like it is activating Quick Look, which would just be the spacebar by itself. Maybe make sure you hit the Command key first, then press space?

Hugh Husband

Stunning! Once again your tuition is entirely on point; I have Siri playing my music and breaking off to note a reminder and then resuming playing! Thank you very much from a UK follower.

Gary -- Your suggested remedy works! For others that have problems activating Siri by simultaneously "holding" command + space, the benefits of this excellent tip with the Mac will now come to life. Just press command key first, and keep holding while you also press the space bar. Highly recommend other readers recognize the value of MacMost here and express their support through the Patreon portal.

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10 Actually Useful Siri Commands To Use On Your Mac

Comments: 6 Responses to “10 Actually Useful Siri Commands To Use On Your Mac”

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