How exercise I minimise windows on a Mac? And how do I make the minimised window go dorsum to normal or fullscreen view?

Macs are like shooting fish in a barrel to use, and few things come more than naturally to modern users than the desktop and windows metaphor. Just lots of newcomers to Mac OS X (especially those coming over from Windows) discover it tricky to shut, maximise and minimise app windows.

In this guide we're going to have a good wait at the nuts and bolts of windows direction in Mac OS X: non only minimising and maximising windows, but opening, closing and even zooming windows. The desktop and windows metaphor forms the majority of your interaction with a Mac, subsequently all. We'll await at how to manage apps and windows on your Mac.

Updated: nine June 2016 with a guide on how to close apps on iPad and iPhone.

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How to open and close windows on a Mac

How to zoom a Window on a Mac using the Menu bar

Windows are the rectangular mini-screens that display information from an app beyond office of your monitor brandish (or all of it, if that window is running in fullscreen mode). A window shows data related to an app. Some apps (similar iTunes) merely have one window; others have a window for each document that you accept.

Typically, when you click on an app'southward icon in Applications (or in the Dock), it volition open up a new window for that app. If the app already has a window open, it will switch to the window instead. Hither are the ways you lot can open up a new window:

  • Choose on File > New to open a second window (sometimes it will be New Window, New Bare Certificate or a similar term).
  • Press Command + N.
  • Command-click the icon in the Dock and cull New Window (non available in all apps).

Closing a window is but every bit like shooting fish in a barrel. In that location are lots of different means to shut a window:

  • Click the red shut button in the top-left of a Window.
  • Choose File > Close Window.
  • Printing Command-Westward.
  • Choose File > Shut All Windows.

I style Mac Os Ten differs from Windows is that when you lot close the concluding window, the app itself stays open. If you look at the Dock, y'all will still see a small dot underneath the app icon to betoken that information technology's nonetheless open. If you desire to quit the app, yous will need to choose the app's name in the Card bar and Quit (or press Command-Q).

How to Minimise windows on a Mac

Minimize, zoom button on a Mac

If you keep opening windows, y'all'll before long have more than than you can fit on the screen at once. One way that you lot tin can manage windows is to minimise the ones that you aren't currently using. Minimise shrinks the window down to the right-manus side of the Dock at the bottom of the screen.

  • Click the yellow Minimise button in the top-right of the window.
  • Choose Window > Minimise.
  • Press Control-M.
  • Press Control-Option-M to minimise all windows belonging to that app.

Learning to press Command-K (and Control-Option-Thou, likewise known as Control-Alt-Yard) are some of the handiest shortcuts you tin know. They quickly enable y'all to get rid of windows that you don't want correct at present, only will desire to employ later.

Almost people just click on a window'southward pocket-size preview icon in the Dock to return to it, but in that location are a few unlike ways to return to a minimised window.

  • Click the icon in the Dock.
  • Command-click the icon and choose Open up.
  • Choose Window from the app'south card and select the window from the list at the bottom.
  • Cull Window > Bring all to Front end.
  • Hold Choice and choose Window > Arrange to Front (this cascades all the windows).
  • In Safari, yous tin can likewise cull Window > Merge All Windows. This command opens all the minimised windows as tabs.

How to Maximise (or Zoom) windows on a Mac

Full Screen button on Mac

One thing you need to larn equally a Mac user is that you don't "maximise" windows, you "zoom" them. And from Yosemite onwards, zoom has been put on the back-burner in favour of Full Screen.

To take a window into fullscreen view, you lot click on the green Full Screen icon in the tiptop-left of the window. Click it once again to go back to standard view. Or choose View > Exit Total Screen (Command-Option-F).

Zoom is a different creature entirely, and it's not quite. The dark-green push used to be zoom in Bone X, and you can even so admission zoom past holding down Selection and clicking the green button.

But zoom isn't quite the aforementioned equally maximise on a Windows machine. On Windows, it automatically fills the whole brandish, while Zoom on a Mac takes the window to its optimal largest size. So it may non fill the whole screen, only volition rather have up as much infinite every bit it should.

You can also choose Window > Zoom to zoom the window. Nearly users these days switch to Full Screen instead.

You tin likewise resize a window in Os X by dragging any of the four corners of a window. The corners enable yous to shrink (or grow) each window to any size you want, and so y'all can use Window > Zoom to render to the optimal size.

Read next: How to set upward and manage user accounts on a Mac

How to close apps on iPad or iPhone

How to close apps on iPad or iPhone

iOS is well congenital in order to deal with multiple apps in the background, and so you lot don't have to worry about apps taking up battery life or resources.

However, if an app is misbehaving and you lot want to close it, information technology'due south easy enough to forcefully stop it.

Starting time you lot need to open the App Switcher, to practise this double-press (non tap) the Home push button and you lot'll be presented with diverse apps. Gyre through until you find the app you desire to force quit, and simply swipe it away by flicking up - you can close as many every bit y'all desire.

Once you've finished closing the apps you want, either tap on 1 of the apps in the App Switcher menu or press the home button.