Mac Dictionary App Tips And Tricks

The Dictionary app on your Mac allows you to look up word definitions and so much more. There is also a thesaurus, special dictionary of Apple-related terms, and many more you can add. Plus, you can use it as a Wikipedia browser. There are also several ways to access dictionary definitions outside the app.

You can also watch this video at YouTube (but with ads).

Video Transcript: Hi, this is Gary with MacMost.com. Today let's take a look at the Mac Dictionary app.
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So when it comes to the Dictionary app on your Mac there are some users that don't know it's there and others that take it for granted. It has a lot of different functionality. You can launch it by using Spotlight. I'm going to do Command Space and search for dictionary. Just the first couple letters is all I need and I can launch it that way. I could use Launchpad. I could drag it to the left side of the Dock to make it a little more easily accessible if I want to.
Now the basics are pretty simple. To look up a word you just type it here in the Search field at the top and then you get a definition. Now you should see here a list of dictionaries that you have enabled. So you have the regular dictionary which will give you a definition. You probably see some others here as well. Of particular use is the Thesaurus or synonym finder. So you search for a word and then go to that and then get different synonyms for it. Now whether you're looking at dictionary definitions or in the Thesaurus you can click on most things in here. So if you see a word you can click on it and it will go to the entry for that. You can switch between dictionaries and keep the same word.
Now what about these other dictionaries here. You can see Apple and Wikipedia. Apple is particularly useful if you want to look up a tech term. So you could look it up in the dictionary but clicking on Apple will give you a definition from a custom Apple dictionary. It's very useful for looking up things that have to do with Apple computers and devices. For instance if you hear some term and you're not sure what it is you can look it up here and find out that definition according to Apple. Now Wikipedia is really useful because this can search the entire Wikipedia site. So instead of going to wikipedia.word search wikipedia you can do it right here in the Dictionary app. It's actually pulling these definitions live from Wikipedia. So you're getting the most up-to-date versions. Not something stored on your computer.
So you can view more than one dictionary source at a time by selecting All. Then you're going to see things like Dictionary, Thesaurus, Wikipedia and anything you've got here. It's all just going to be in a big list. You can set which dictionaries you've got by going to Dictionary Preferences which is basically a big list of dictionaries. You're going to have a lot of these that come installed on your Mac. The ones that you have selected at the beginning depends on your country. So here in the US I have the New Oxford American Dictionary for American English. But there are other ones that are available as well. Notice that when I select some of these there are options. For instance I can choose the type of pronunciation marks that are shown in the definition here for the American Dictionary. For Wikipedia I can select language. But most of these will just simply have copyright information there. 
If you want to add another dictionary you can just select it and you can see it gets added here. You could see now that dictionary as well. The order here is important. You can drag and drop anyone of these to change the order. So now I've switched Wikipedia and Apple. When you select All you're going to get them in the order that they appear here. So put your most important source first. So let's look at some more functionality here in the app window.
You can change the Font size. If it's too small for you to read you can make it larger and you can also make it smaller. There are also Forward and Backward buttons just like in a web browser. So you can go back to the previous definition after exploring a new one. You also can open up links in New Tabs or Windows. So, for instance, I can Control click here and you could see I could select Look Up in New Tab or Window. So New Tab will give you a tab just like browser tabs or tabs in any other app or I could Control click and select New Window and have multiple dictionary windows open. You control these tabs just like tabs in any other app. So I can move them around. I can close them. I can even go to File and start a New Window or New Tab without actually clicking on another word. I also have a Plus button here to open up even more tabs.
Now if you don't understand these cryptic little pronunciation guides here you also can have your Mac speak the word to you. Now you'd think since it's a computer generated voice and all that it might mispronounce some things. But it's actually pretty good. I looked up some of the most commonly mispronounced words and it gets them right. So in order to have it pronounce something you can't really click here because it breaks it up into syllables. Usually you can find the word somewhere here in the definition or in an example phrase or something. Control click on it and choose Speech and Start Speaking. As you can see it actually pronounced that one right. This one it gets right as well. Even this one. So it looks like the pronunciations can be pretty trusted.
There are several other ways to access the Dictionary without even opening the Dictionary app. One is to simply look up a word. So you could select a word and then Control click on it and select Look Up. You're going to get this window that gives you the dictionary definition. This is from the Dictionary app but it appears in a separate window. You can click on links here at the bottom to open this up in the Dictionary app. You can even switch dictionaries here at the bottom. Now you can also use the keyboard shortcut Control Command D with your cursor hovering over something. It doesn't need to be selected. That will also bring up the same thing.
There's a further keyboard shortcut. If you go into System Preferences and then go to Keyboard, Shortcuts and look under Services and then look at the category called Searching. There's look up in Dictionary. You can add a shortcut. Let's add Control Option Command D as a shortcut for this. Now when I select a word I can try to use this. It also appears under the Application Menu, Services, Searching. This will actually go right to the Dictionary app so it's different than the standard Look Up shortcut which opens up that special window.
Now you can also use Spotlight to look up words. Command Space to bring up Spotlight. Now you can just use the word and it should look it up and give you a definition here. You can see it's the definition from the Dictionary app. If you double click on it here it will actually open up the Dictionary app right to that word. 
The problem with using dictionaries to figure out how words are spelled is that sometimes you can't look it up because you don't know how the word is spelled. Right. So you can use Siri for this. So just ask Siri and it will give you a dictionary definition. Siri, how do you spell phlegm. 
p h l e g m. So you can see there I can get a definition by just speaking the word. Unfortunately that doesn't link to the Dictionary even though the data is obviously taken from the Dictionary. 
So a few other tips here. If you remember when we had actual physical dictionary's you'd also remember that at the beginning of the dictionary and at the end of the dictionary there was all this additional information. Things about languages and history and all sorts of things. You actually have that with some of the dictionaries here. So here I have the dictionary selected. I'm using the New Oxford American Dictionary. If I do Go, Front/Back Matter it actually takes me to a list of all of this information from that dictionary. So I could jump to things like the Key to Pronunciations for instance. Or the History of English. Not all dictionaries are going to have this so you're no going to see this for everything here. 
Now if you want to add more dictionaries to the list here you can. It will use any standard dictionary file. They are also known as .DICT files or sometimes .dictionary files. You can actually find them online and add them. Now they are kind of difficult to find and sometimes you find ones that just don't work because they are other formats as well that call themselves dictionary formats. But if you do find one the way to add it is to go to File, then Open Dictionaries folder. This will open up the Home Folder Library Dictionary Folder. You can add dictionaries in here. So for instance here I've got one that translates from English to Esperanto. Now I'm going to Quit the Dictionary app and run it again. Now when I go to Preferences I should be able to find that in here. There it is all the way at the bottom. I'll select that and now you could see it in here.  So now I can look up a word and go to this translation dictionary and get a translation there. A lot of the dictionaries you get by default here are actually  translation dictionaries.
One last tip I want to show you though I won't demonstrate it is if you go to System Preferences Screen Time and then you go to Content  and Privacy and you turn on Content and Privacy Restrictions, there is an option here for explicit language in Siri and Dictionary. So that will eliminate some words from the dictionary that are considered explicit. Cleaning your dictionary up a bit.

Comments: 6 Responses to “Mac Dictionary App Tips And Tricks”

mike O.

4 years ago

I had a virus on my computer a month ago and erased everything and installed fresh. Now i no longer have any options in the preferences except Wikipedia. How do i get them back?

Gary Rosenzweig

Mike: Ouch. And there's nothing at all in preferences? That's odd. All the dictionaries come with the macOS install.

Jenny W.

Thanks for this post! I had no idea the dictionary was so versatile. I have always gone to another tab to look up a pronunciation.

John Seymour

Hi Gary, I have the Oxford English dictionary on my mac with OS Catalina 10.15.6. The selected word is followed by the pronunciation which is in another language which I am not familiar with. Is there a method of changing to plain english pronunciation, or can I import say Collins Concise english onto the task bar?
I prefer to read rather than to hear a pronunciation.
Would very much appreciate your comment as this subject has been a bother for quite a few years!
Cheers, John

John: I'm not sure what you are dealing with there. Is this an app, or in the Dictionary app itself? Where exactly do you hear this other language? I'm not sure if Collins has an app or something you can download, you should check with them,

Shepp

Gary, outstanding vid and content on Dictionary! Clear and precise, super easy to follow; you Sir have a gift...thank you for sharing. Shepp.

Comments Closed.

Mac Dictionary App Tips And Tricks

Comments: 6 Responses to “Mac Dictionary App Tips And Tricks”

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