How to screenshot on Mac?

A quick guide if you want to know how to screenshot on Mac

If you’ve recently bought a Mac and you’re still figuring your way around the various commands and keyboard shortcuts, you might have come across some simple ways of capturing screenshots. Screenshots are vital to capturing and sharing information and making life a lot easier when we’re in a rush.

It’s super common to use screenshots to show evidence of something, to share something we like with friends and loved ones, or even to show customer support there is a particular problem with something that we need to be fixed. However you use screenshots, the great news is that there are several easy and hassle-free ways you can screenshot on a Mac, making your life a lot easier when it comes to saving information.

We’re going to share three popular ways to screenshot and explain why you can make use of them at different times.

Option 1: Shift-Command-3

Source: Webdevelopersnotes

This is the most straightforward way of screenshotting on your Mac and is the given command from Apple. Simply bring up the information you want to save on your screen and hold down all three keys simultaneously, and it will automatically save a screenshot on your desktop. You can then open up a third-party app or iPhoto to edit or crop your screenshot before using it.

Option 2: Shift-Command-4

Source: wplook

This is where it gets interesting. You can use this combination of keys to turn your cursor into a ‘crosshair.’ What on earth is a crosshair, we hear you ask? It’s basically just a little icon that you can drag to a specific portion of your screen to capture a screenshot. To screenshot, you simply release your trackpad to take the shot.

When using Shift-Command-4, you also have some other helpful options that can help you screenshot with accuracy instead of just a specific part of the screen. If you press and release the space bar when holding Shift-Command-4, the crosshair turns into a camera icon, which you can move over any open window, which then allows you to take a picture of it. You can also press and hold the space bar down, and this locks in the shape and size of the selection area and then enables you to reposition it somewhere else on the screen.

Using Shift-Command-4 instead of Shift-Command-3 essentially gives you more control over the desktop when taking a screenshot and saves you time editing or cropping the screen afterward.

Option 3: Shift-Command-5

The third and final option that we’re going to introduce you to for screenshotting on Mac is Shift-Command-5. This was only recently introduced as part of MacOS Mojave (2018), so it won’t work on older models that haven’t been updated.

It’s also the most comprehensive option when it comes to taking screenshots on your Mac, as it brings up a control pad at the bottom of your screen with a number of capture options. You are able to either capture your entire screen, a single window, or a selection of your screen.

Even more impressive, you have the option of capturing a recording of your screen or a selection of it, using one of the two options at the bottom right of the panel. This is an excellent option if you want to screenshot videos or perhaps even yourself during a Zoom call, as it’s becoming an increasingly popular way of communicating right now.

Source: switchingtomac

Easy way to do

Another interesting component of the control panel that pops up when you press Shift-Command-5 is the options menu. This gives you much more control over the things you bring into focus on your screen and allows you to move items around before taking the shot, thanks to the five and ten-second delay options available to you.

The final thing to note about Shift-Command-5 is that you can change where your screenshots are saved. Helpfully, they are currently saved to the desktop as default, which is super helpful when you need quick access to them. But if you find yourself taking a lot of screenshots for a specific project, you might find it easier to save them in a particular location on your Mac.

Under the menu section ‘save to’ when the toolbar is open, simply select a new default location like documents or clipboard, whichever is most convenient for you. This is an excellent option if you don’t like your desktop cluttered with hundreds of randomly named files that you can’t seem to work your way through when you’re looking for something!

What about Shift-Command-6?

Source: how to geek

You might have noticed a pattern developing here! Apple has tried to keep things simple for you by programming the screenshot commands in chronological order, with 3 being the simplest way to go about it and 5 giving you the most control. It makes sense and indeed makes your life easier, as you don’t have to remember a load of complicated shortcuts to save your screenshots.

When it comes to Shift-Command-6, this is only available to MacBook Pro users who have a touch bar. This command enables you to take a screenshot of the touch bar, and it will save it to your desktop as a .png file that you can access in the same way you would a typical screenshot.

Conclusion

As you can see, Apple has made it pretty straightforward for Mac users to save a screenshot. If you’re just looking for a quick snap that you can share informally with your friends, Shift-Command-3 works perfectly fine. However, if you want added control over what you want to screenshot, it’s best to use the combination with 4 or 5, as this gives you flexibility about which part of the screen or which windows, in particular, you want to save.

Don’t forget that you can also change where screenshots are saved, which helps you manage the files on your desktop better and means you don’t have to spend time looking for important files.

We hope that you could learn that how to screenshot on mac. If you are a visual type of person, then we can recommend this short video for you to watch.

If you need a longer version, then we might recommend this one for you: