How to take a screenshot on Mac
The short answer
Press Command + Shift + 3 to capture your entire screen — the screenshot saves to your desktop automatically.
How to capture the full screen
Press Command + Shift + 3 and your Mac will take a screenshot of everything on your screen. You’ll see a small thumbnail preview appear in the bottom-right corner. The file is saved to your desktop as a .png image.
If you have multiple monitors, this captures all screens at once, saving one file per display.
How to capture a selected area
Press Command + Shift + 4 and your cursor turns into a crosshair. Click and drag to select the area you want to capture, then release to take the screenshot.
A few helpful tricks while selecting:
- Hold Shift to lock the selection to horizontal or vertical movement only
- Hold Option to resize the selection from its center
- Press Escape to cancel without taking a screenshot
How to capture a specific window
Press Command + Shift + 4, then press Spacebar. Your cursor turns into a camera icon. Hover over the window you want and click it. This captures the window with a nice drop shadow automatically.
This works for any window, including menus, the Dock, and the menu bar.
How to use the screenshot toolbar
Press Command + Shift + 5 to open the built-in screenshot toolbar. This gives you buttons for:
- Capture entire screen, a selected window, or a selected area
- Record your screen as a video (full screen or selected area)
- Options to change where screenshots are saved, set a timer, or hide the thumbnail preview
This is the most flexible option if you want more control over your screenshots.
Where do screenshots go?
By default, all screenshots save to your desktop with a filename like “Screenshot 2026-03-22 at 10.30.15 AM.png.”
To change the save location, press Command + Shift + 5, click Options, and choose a different folder like Documents or Clipboard.
To copy a screenshot to the clipboard instead of saving a file, add Control to any shortcut (for example, Command + Control + Shift + 3).
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