

- CHANGE THE DEFAULT OPENING PROGRAM FOR A FILE TYPE MAC HOW TO
- CHANGE THE DEFAULT OPENING PROGRAM FOR A FILE TYPE MAC MAC OS
If you have any questions about this process please feel free to post them in our Mac OS Forum. Now, if you double-click ona this type of file it will open with the default program that was configured when the Mac OS was installed. The file extension has now been reset to the default program that was configured when Mac OS was installed. You can now close the Information screen. Once you click on the Change All button, every file of this type will now be reset to use the default program. If you wish to make it so that all files of this type use the default application, you should now click on the Change All. The Open With option should now be set to use the default application you selected.Ĭurrently, only this individual file has been reset to use the default program. This is the original default application in Mac OS for this type of file.

In the drop down menu that appears you will see an application that contains the (default) phrase. To change it back to the default setting, you need to select the down/up arrow menu as shown in the image below. In our example above, this means that if you double-clicked on the About Stacks.pdf file it would be open in Safari. You will now see the current program that this file type is configured to use when you double-click on it. When you select the Get Info menu option, the file's information page will be displayed as shown below.Įxpand the Open with: category as shown in the image above. Once you are at that file, right click on it and select the Get Info option as shown in the image below. Once file extensions are visible on files, navigate to a file that is the type that you would like to reset back to the Mac OS defaults. File extensions, those bits of text that follow a period at the end.
CHANGE THE DEFAULT OPENING PROGRAM FOR A FILE TYPE MAC HOW TO
To do this, please follow the instructions found in the tutorial How to show filename extensions on a Mac. Back in the pre-Mac OS X and macOS days, Apple’s System 9 and earlier relied on hidden metadata to associate files with apps. This tutorial will explain how to restore your default file associations in Mac OS.īefore changing a file extension back to its defaults, you should first enable your Mac to view file extensions so that you can find a file containing the extension you want to reset. After you have changed this file association, though, you may want to reset this file association back to the default program that Mac OS was configured with when it was installed. Unfortunately, only email apps will be listed here so apps like browsers that can handle mailto requests will not show up in the list.įor most other app types e.g., movies, audio files, text files, and even Plist files, you will set the default app by following the general files method.In the Mac OS it is possible to change the default program the operating system will use to open a file when you double-click on it. You must, of course, have a different email client installed on your Mac or it will not appear in this list. Open it, and select a different email client. On the General tab, there’s a dropdown called ‘Default email reader’.

Once the app is open, go to its preferences (tap Command+,). Don’t worry if you do not have any email account set up. In order to change the default mail client, you need to open the Mail app. Select the one you want to use as the default browser. Open it and it will list all the browsers installed on your Mac.

Open the System Preferences app and go to the General preference. Confirm the change and it will be applied. You will get a prompt telling you that the default app will be changed for all files of that type. Once you’ve selected the app, click ‘Change all’. Open the dropdown and select the app you want to set as the default app for that file type. In the window that opens, look for the Open With section. Right-click it and select Get Info from the context menu. General filesįor general files like text files, images, or media files, you need to have at least one type of the file present on your system. We’re going to detail the process for general files, and for browsers and mail clients separately. Here’s how you can change default apps on macOS. Likewise, not everyone uses the default Mail app either. Lots of people still prefer to use Chrome instead of Safari on macOS. MacOS has some of the best apps for everyday tasks but that doesn’t mean everyone loves or uses them.
