Mac App Switcher Tips and Hidden Functions

There are a lot of hidden functions in the Mac App Switcher. You can quit and hide apps using it, switch to a specific window, and use it to drag and drop.

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Video Transcript: Hi, this is Gary with MacMost.com. Let's go beyond the basics and take a look at some of the hidden functions of the App Switcher. 
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So the App Switcher lets you switch between apps that are currently running on your Mac. The basics are that you hold the Command Key down and then with that held down you continue to hold it while you press the Tab Key. The first time you do this you'll get a list of all of the apps that are currently running. Every time you press Tab the selection will move one to the right. So one app is selected at a time and if you go to the end and continue to press Tab it goes back to the beginning. So if you want to switch to an app, like for instance I'll switch top Photos, I advance to that app icon and then at that point I release the Command Key and that app comes to the front. 
Notice then if I use Command and then Tab again the order of the apps is such that the front-most app is all the way to the left but it automatically starts on the second app so I could switch between two apps by using Command Tab and then using Command Tab again. You can see how this will always switch me between the two apps that are all the way to the left side. If I move to another app, like let's say Notes and use that, then notice that one is all the way to the left and I can now use a quick Command Tab to switch between these two apps. 
Another thing you should know is when you Hide an app, like the Photos App here, I can use Photos and then Hide Photos or Command H. It still appears here in the App Switcher. So if I switch to it while it is hidden it's Unhidden and brought to the front. 
Now let's look at somethings you may not know you could do with the App Switcher. One is that you can actually use the Mouse or Trackpad to select an app. So I'm going to use Command Tab and while still holding down the Command Key I'm going to use my Trackpad and point to an app that I want to switch to. So if I want to switch to, say, Pages I can simply now release the Command Key or I could click Pages and it will jump to that app and bring all its windows to the front. 
Sticking to just the keyboard if you use Command and then Tab it always moves forward every time you press tab. But you can move backward as well. To do that you can hold the Shift Key down and then press Tab or use the key that is just above the Tab on US keyboards. That's the backtick or tilde key. If you use that one it moves backwards. Since those two keys are adjacent to each other it is easy to go forward and backward to get to the app that you want. 
There's actually a third way to go backwards. If you do Command Tab to initiate the App Switcher you can use the left arrow key and move back. In fact the right arrow key will move forward. So, if you want to use just the arrow keys, which sometimes feel a little more intuitive, you can us Command Tab to initiate the App Switcher and continue to hold Command down and then use the right and left arrow keys to select the app you want, release Command to jump to it. 
In addition you can also use the Spacebar or Return Key to make a selection. So, I can go over here to Notes and while still holding down Command if I press Space it will jump to Notes. You can do the same thing go to Pages here and if I press Return it will go to Pages. Although it makes more sense just to release the Command Key you have to do that anyway. 
But what if you change your mind and don't want to switch to an app. So I do Command Tab and now I'm in the App Switcher and I realize, wait I want to stick with Pages but I'm all the way over here at the Finder now. I can go all the way back to Pages and release Command or I can just press the Escape Key and it just dismisses the App Switcher. 
So let's talk about deeper functionality because you can do more with the App Switcher then to just switching to an app. If you initiate the App Switcher and then get to an app, it doesn't even have to be one that you can currently see, you can Quit it by using the Q Key. So I still have the Command Key held down. If I didn't the app Switcher would go away. But if I press Q the app that is selected will Quit. It is the same as if I actually switched to the app and then went to the Apps Menu and chose Quit. So it won't get you out of things like if you need to Save a document before quitting or there is some other prompt. But if you can just cleanly quit the app you can do it with the App Switcher which means you can quickly go through different apps and just use the Q Key and quit a bunch of them really easily. 
Another letter that you can use is H. So you initiate the App Switcher and you can use H to Hide something. So, for instance, I can see Pages here. I can see a bunch of Pages windows behind System Settings. If I use H it hides Pages. So Pages is still running. It is the same as if I brought Pages to the front and then went into the Pages Menu and selected Hide Pages. I can easily bring it back by just actually going to the app or if I'm in the App Switcher and have it selected I can use H to actually Unhide the app. 
                                                                          
Now you may be familiar with App Exposé. That is a way for you to view all the open windows in an app on the screen. You could actually initiate Ann Exposé while in the App Switcher. So I'm going to use Command Tab and then I'm going to go just to the first one here, Pages. I've got 3 Pages windows open but they are not at the front. If at this point I use either the Up or Down Arrow Key it enters App Expose'. I can actually release the Command Key now and I can use the arrow keys to navigate around. It will show me the currently opened windows but also, in a lot of apps, it shows you recently opened documents. So I can select the one that I want and then press the Spacebar to Preview it or I can press Return and it actually brings that window to the front just like if I had switched to it in the App Switcher but with the window I wanted at the front instead of whatever window was at the front before. 
Now you can also use the App Switcher if you have Full Screen windows. Let's take this Pages window full screen. I'm going to do Control Left Arrow to go back here. Let's go to, say, this Finder window and make that full screen and then let's travel back to this desktop and let's do the Photos App as full screen. If I use Mission Control now, Control Up Arrow, you can see I've got a Desktop in three different full screen apps. So, let's see what happens if I switch to Photos. If I do Command Tab and switch to Photos. It will not only switch to Photos but take me to the proper space, in this case the space with the full screen photos windows. Now, what happens if I do that with Pages?  With Pages it actually takes me here because I have two Pages windows open on this Desktop. So whether you go to the full screen space really depends what you have going on with Windows for that particular app. Note that there is a Setting for this. In System Settings if you go to Desktop & Dock and scroll down to Mission Control there is a setting here for When Switching to an Application, Switch to a Space with Open Windows for that Application. 
Now let's talk about using Stage Manager with the App Switcher. So I'm going to go to Control Center here and switch on Stage Manager. You can see here on the left. I can switch to one of these other apps. Like we can switch to this App Set here which has Pages documents. We can switch to this App Set here which has just has this Photos App window here. If I use the App Switcher it works just like you would expect. I'm going to switch to Pages here and it switches the App Set. I can switch to System Settings and it again it switches that App Set. Now I only have limited room for so many App Sets here. So some of these things are missing. For instance Mail isn't even shown as an App Set on the left. There is not enough room for all of these. But if I switch to Mail using the App Switcher then it will come up just as you expect and now since I've just used Mail if I go to another App Set, like the Pages App Set here, it takes its place here on the left. So the App Switcher actually is critical if you are using Stage Manager because you need it to go beyond just the few App Sets that can fit here on the left side. 
Now you can also use the App Switcher while you're dragging and dropping. So let's say I am composing an email message here and I realize I want to put an image in it. I want to take that image from the Photos App. So what I can do here is I can switch to the Photos App, find the image I want, and start dragging it. But I can't see the Mail window there. So I'm going to use the App Switcher while still dragging. So I have my right hand, in this case, dragging using the trackpad. My left hand is going to use Command Tab to initiate the App Switcher. Switch to the Mail App and now I can drop the image into the message I was composing. You can do this virtually anywhere that you do drag and drop.
So there is a second way to drag and drop with the App Switcher. That's to drag and drop into the App Switcher icon. So, for instance, let's say I want to drag this into Notes. I can drag it, like that, initiate the App Switcher, and with the App Switcher still on I could drop it right here into Notes. You can see how it creates a new Note with this image. Or for instance I can drag this image here, start the App Switcher, and drag it into Mail and it will create a new message with that image. 
So here I'm in the Finder. I can do the same thing with a File here. So I can take this file here. Drag and drop into, say, Mail and it starts a new message with that file as an attachment. Just like if I had dragged it into the Dock. 
So there are a whole bunch of different tips for using the App Switcher. Hope you found this useful. Thanks for watching.

Comments: 8 Responses to “Mac App Switcher Tips and Hidden Functions”

Roy Whelden

12 months ago

Great hints for the use of app switcher. Thanks.

Chris Phillips

I always read your free tutorials, but the most recent one leaves me in total amazement ! I am always so surprised that your knowledge of Apple procedures is so encyclopedic and how you manage to remember so much about actually operating what to me is beyond anything that I shall ever achieve. However, your latest offering "Mac App Switcher Tips" takes the biscuit. I am in wonderment that you can remember which keys to press let alone the right order. I shall keep trying though !...... Thanks.

Sheldon

Thanks bunches

Chris

What do you think is Apple’s reasoning for minimized apps not displaying (i.e., not becoming un-minimized) when selected via the App Switcher? I believe pressing the Option button when releasing the App Switcher keys will display the minimized app…but that requires being a keyboard contortionist!

Gary Rosenzweig

Chris: I don't know for sure. But it make sense to me. If you have 3 windows open in Pages, for instance, and 2 are minimized, it would be bad to have those 2 minimized windows suddenly un-minimize just because you switched to Pages.

Andrea Grasselli

Thank you Gary, very useful!

Raul

I was a Windows user since Windows 3.1 and now I bought a MacBook and this switcher tips save my problem of dragging a picture to an email. Great presentation!

Steve

11 months ago

I’ve used the Yoink app for years, but after watching your App Switcher video, I may turn Yoink off!
I prefer keyboard instead of trackpad or mouse, so I’ll be using the arrow keys with App Switcher from now on.

Keep up the good work, Gary!

Mac App Switcher Tips and Hidden Functions

Comments: 8 Responses to “Mac App Switcher Tips and Hidden Functions”

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