What is Mission Control on MacOS? Is It Useful?.
MacOS has many powerful built-in tools to help users be more productive during the day, and one of the most effective of these is Mission Control on Mac. Mission Control allows users to see every open application and makes it easy to switch between virtual desktops.
If you’re only using two apps at a time, you can easily switch between them by pressing CTRL + Tab; but if you are working with six or more at the same time, it is much easier to select the desired application through Mission Control. You can also easily find open applications and close them for better productivity.
This guide will detail how to use Mission Control on a Mac and take full advantage of one of the best features of macOS.
How to Activate Mission Control on Mac
You can open Mission Control in one of several ways. The first (and easiest) method is to swipe up with three or four fingers on the Magic trackpad or trackpad. This will open Mission Control and allow you to easily view each open window.
You can also double-tap the surface of the Magic Mouse with two fingers to open Mission Control. If you’re using an iMac with official Apple accessories, this is the easiest way.
If you don’t have a Magic Mouse, you can launch Mission Control by clicking the icon in the Dock or pressing the corresponding hotkey. You can customize a key on your keyboard to open Mission Control, but F3 is the default key to open the program.
–
If none of these methods suit your workflow, the good news is that you can customize how Mission Control opens (as well as a number of other features on macOS) in System Preferences.
- First open System Preferences and then click the Mission Control icon. It is most often found in the top row between the Dock icon and the Siri icon.
- When you open Mission Control preferences, you will see a section with four check boxes. Below is the section “Keyboard and Mouse Shortcuts”. Here you can set your own shortcuts to open Mission Control.
- If you click the dropdown next to Mission Control, you can select any of the F keys as well as Shift Left and Right, Control, Option and Command to be your shortcut
- If you need even more options, press Shift, Control, Option, or Command to display possible keyboard macros that you can set.
- If you click the Hot Corners button in the lower left corner, you can set up various commands that will be activated when you move the cursor to the four corners of the screen.
Each corner may have its own command from the list, which includes launching Mission Control, Windows applications, returning to the desktop, invoking the Action Center, putting the display to sleep, locking the screen and much more.
Use virtual desktops
Another big benefit of Mission Control on Mac is how easily you can switch between different desktops on macOS. Using multiple desktops makes it easy to organize different sections of your computer for different tasks.
If you open Mission Control, a + symbol appears at the top right of the screen. Click here to create a new desktop (or space). You can create up to 16 of these desktops on a single machine, although few users need more than two or three.
When you have multiple desktops open, you can switch between them by swiping right or left with three fingers. You can also hold down the CTRL key and press the right or left arrow. Once inside the desktop, you can open any application you want; however, you can also drag and drop open applications from one desktop to another from Mission Control.
Is Mission Control on Mac Really Useful?
There are many productivity apps on the market. Many of the so-called “best features” are rarely used, leading to skepticism about tools like Mission Control. If you’re a casual user who uses your computer to browse social media and send multiple emails, you probably won’t see a huge benefit from Mission Control.
On the other hand, power users will benefit greatly from Mission Control. For example, while writing this tutorial, the author had the photo editing, word processor, file management, and browser windows open and used Mission Control to seamlessly switch between them.
Do you use Mission Control frequently on Mac? How does this affect your daily productivity on macOS? Let us know in the comments below.
–