An App To Take Screenshots On Mac

How to take a screenshot on a Mac hold down ⌘ command: and shift: and press # 3 = Your Mac captures the entire screen and saves it as a file on the desktop. The file name will look like “Screen shot 2020-07-09 at 08.45.00 AM.png”. May 15, 2020  Mac OS screenshot organization. If you take a lot of screenshots then you’re probably way too used to your Downloads folder or Desktop being clogged up with images that have filenames like “Screen Shot 2019-XX-XX at 21.36.15”. Unfortunately, this inelegant and cluttered outcome is the default Mac screenshot shortcut.

Categorized under Mac OS X

Oct 18, 2019  So how to screenshot on Mac, Windows, and Linux? How to take a screenshot on Mac OS X. A Mac OS X user can create several types of screenshots using different types of Mac screenshot shortcut. Full screen screenshot to your desktop. The key combination for creating such screenshots is as follows: Cmd + Shift + 3. The screenshot will be saved on.

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Last month, I posted a short and straightforward guide to show you how to take a screenshot on a Mac computer, similar to the way you use PrtScr or Print Screen key on Windows.

Taking a screenshot on a Mac computer is incredibly easy by using a few keyboard shortcuts. It depends on the keyboard shortcuts. You will be able to take a screenshot of an entire display or a part of it by dragging a box around the area you want to capture.

In this guide, I will explain each method, how it works, as well as taking normal screenshots of Mac; screenshots of a specific area or window; a timed screenshot with Grab; or taking screenshots with third party apps.

How To Take A Screenshot On A Mac Computer

I don’t know how often you use your Mac, but I use it for more than eight hours a day. From everything related to my job, such as reading and replying to emails; doing research and writing articles. I take a lot of screenshots on my Mac laptop daily.

How To Take A Screenshot Of A Part Of Your Mac Screen

My favorite method to take a screenshot on my Mac is pressing these keys: Command + Shift + 4.

Command + Shift + 4

By doing so, your cursor will be turned into a selection box, which will allow you to drag and select areas of your screen that you want to capture. Then you release the mouse button or trackpad to take the screenshot and save it as a PNG file on your desktop.

How To Take A Screenshot Of The Entire Mac Screen

If you want to take a screenshot of your entire display on your Mac, just press Command + Shift + 3. The PNG image file of your screenshot will be saved to your desktop.

Command + Shift + 3

I don’t often use this method as it will take a screenshot of the entire Mac screen, which I don’t need. If you need a particular area of your screen, use the above method. If you use the Command + Shift + 3 shortcut, you need to edit the PNG image again to crop the area your want.

How To Take A Screenshot Of A Selected Window

This method uses the same shortcut as the first method but needs one extra step: Spacebar.

Firstly, hit Command + Shift + 4, your mouse cursor will be turned into a selection box.

Next, press the Spacebar key to turn your mouse cursor into a camera icon. Move the icon over the window that you want to take the screenshot. It will appear highlighted.

Click on it and the screenshot image file will be saved to your Mac desktop as a PNG file automatically.

Change Location Where Your Mac Saves Screenshots

By default, all screenshots will be stored on the desktop screen of your Mac. The name of these image files should be: “Screen Shot + date and time + .png”. Date and time is generated at the moment the screenshot is taken.

However, you can change the location where your Mac computer stores these screenshots. For example, you can create a new folder on your hard drive or even a USB flash drive, and change to save all screenshots directly to this folder.

Don’t know how to do it? Follow this guide to learn how to change the folder where Mac OS X save screenshots.

Capture And Save A Screenshot To Clipboard, Not As A File

Instead of saving a taken screenshot as a PNG file to a selected folder, you can save it to your clipboard, and then paste it into any application as you want. All you need to do is add Control key to the shortcuts you press.

Command + Shift + Control + 3

Screenshots

and

Command + Shift + Control + 4

I’m sure you will need both hands to press all of these keys. Next, you can use Command + V to paste the taken screenshot into any apps, you want.

How To Take A Screenshot On A Mac With Grab

Sometimes, I use the Grab app to take a screenshot on my Mac. What makes this app special? Well, it allows you to start a countdown timer, and when it’s expired, the app will take a screenshot of your entire Mac screen.

It’s a great app to use to assist you to take a screenshot of a menu or of something that will hide when you press any keys. To use the Grab application, launch Finder, click on the Application on the left side, choose Utilities and then Grab.

Or you can also open the Grab app by using Spotlight (Command + Spacebar and search for Grab).

After opening the Grab application, you will not see any window, just look at the menu, it will be shown up there.

Just click on Capture and select the “Timed Screen” option to take a timed screenshot of your Mac.

A new window called “Timed Screen Grab” will show up. Just click on the “Start Timer” button and it will start to counting down from 10 to 0.

The Grab application will take a full screenshot of your Mac and show it within the Grab window. Just select File > Save, to save it if you are happy with it or take a new one.

The Grab application can also allow you to take screenshots of a selected area or a particular window. But it’s probably easier to use above shortcuts than Grab, right?

How To Take A Mac Screenshot With Preview

You can use Preview, a built-in app, to take a screenshot of your Mac screen, and the image file will save as many types as you want, not only PNG.

To take a screenshot on your Mac with Preview, just go to File and select “Take Screen Shot” and then choose the type of screenshot you would like to take. Once you have done so, decide where you want to save the file as well as the file type.

How to take a screenshot on a Mac with Preview application?

Use Other Apps To Take A Screenshot On A Mac

Many Mac apps out there can help you to take screenshots, and you might already have your own favorite app. My favorite app to take screenshots on Mac is the Lightshot Screenshot.

It’s a free application, which is now available to download and install from the Mac App Store.

The Lightshot Screenshot app allows you to capture any parts of your Mac screen, and then upload the image to prntscr.com server, and show you a short link like http://prntscr.com/abcde.

If you want to edit your screenshot images, it’s very easy to do with the Lightning fast image editor, which allows adding arrows, lines and text annotations. You can also share your screenshots via Facebook or Twitter.

Skitch is also a great app to use to take screenshots on Mac with many options, such as full screen, screen snap, timed screen snap, and more. Give it a try, it will help you to take screenshots on your Mac.

Learn how to take a screenshot on a Mac computer with Skitch?

How To Change File Type Of The Screenshot On Mac

By default, if you are using shortcuts to take screenshots, the image files will be saved to your desktop as PNG files. But you can easily change this file type by using the command below in Terminal. Just replace the “type” with a three letter code of the image format, such as JPG, TIF, BMP, PDF – without the quotes.

defaults write com.apple.screencapture type “type” && killall SystemUIServer

For example:

defaults write com.apple.screencapture type JPG && killall SystemUIServer

How To Change The Default Screenshots’ Filename

As I mentioned above, your screenshot will be saved to your desktop by default, with an auto-generated name, like “Screen Shot 2016-06-06 at 18.30.25.png”. However, you can change this name (“Screen Shot”) to another one. Just use the command below in Terminal:

defaults write com.apple.screencapture name “file-name” && killall SystemUIServer

Just replace “file-name” with the name you want, without the quotes. For example, if you want to change it to “Picture”, just use:

defaults write com.apple.screencapture name “Picture” && killall SystemUIServer

There is not much difference as it still has a long date-time generated behind. But it might help you to organize files more easily.

So tell me, what is your favorite screenshot method? Is there anything you still don’t know in how to take a screenshot on a Mac OS X computer? Leave your comment below for your thoughts or questions.

Best screen capturing app
Use CleanShot X for all your screen recording needs.

For many new Apple users, particularly those who are migrating from Windows and are used to that Prt Scrn (Print Screen) button, the answer to the question of how to screenshot on Mac isn’t immediately obvious.

Although it only takes pressing a couple of keys to take a screenshot on Mac, the fact remains that Mac screen capture is something that hasn’t historically felt all that intuitive. For example, in addition to different key commands for screenshotting windows vs. smaller selections, recording video of your screen for a long time was only possible through QuickTime Player.

Best screenshot apps for macOS

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How To Take A Screenshot Mac Os

Although macOS Mojave has changed much of this, how to screenshot on Mac remains a heavy-hitting search query, as not everyone uses the latest version of macOS. Below you’ll find more information on taking a screenshot on Mac (and capturing video), as well as some useful tools to make your Apple screenshot life easier.

Exploring Mac Screenshot Basics

As there’s no dedicated button for print screen on Apple products, there are a few different commands associated with screen capture on Mac that vary slightly depending on your setup.

It makes sense to divide the world of how to take a screenshot on a Mac into pre and post-Mojave, since it was with this iteration of macOS that Apple really revolutionized their Mac screenshot command system.

1. Pre-Mojave Mac screenshot commands

If for whatever reason you don’t want to upgrade to Mojave then you’ll need to familiarize yourself with a couple of key Mac screenshot shortcut options:

  • ⌘ + Shift + 3
  • ⌘ + Shift + 4

The first of these commands is probably the easiest to get to grips with and the quickest one to take advantage of when taking a screenshot on Mac, as it captures the entire screen at once. If you’re using multiple screens, it takes a screenshot in Mac OS for every screen you’re using simultaneously.

An App To Take Screenshots On Mac

The second of the commands represents a slightly more nuanced way to take a snapshot on Mac. Rather than capturing your entire screen, it prompts you to select the area you want to capture. If you follow it up with a press of Space, it allows you to choose the window you want to screencap instead.

Overall, while these commands do let you print screen on Mac, they feel sort of like an afterthought rather than a fully fledged feature of macOS. With so many people looking into how to screenshot on Mac, it’s not surprising that Apple recently decided to make it a little more clear how to screenshot in Mac OS Mojave.

2. Post-Mojave Mac screenshot command menu

In addition to the above commands, which still work for Mojave users, there’s now an option for them that’s very much in keeping with the existing format of how to print screen on Mac — ⌘ + Shift + [Number].

If you’re a Mojave user, you can use ⌘ + Shift + 5to bring up a screen capture menu that will allow you to:

  • Capture Entire Screen
  • Capture Selected Window(s)
  • Capture Selected Portion
  • Record Entire Screen
  • Record Selected Portion

At the right-hand side of this menu there’s also Options that lets you (among other things) select where your MacBook screenshot and video output is saved.

In other words, anyone looking for an easy answer to the question “how do you screenshot on a Mac?” could do a lot worse than considering an upgrade to Mojave in order to streamline the process.

3. Third-party Mac OS screenshot apps

You might notice that, even with the inclusion of ⌘ + Shift + 5 Mac screen capturing menu, the options for taking a Mac screenshot remain pretty basic. If you’re looking for a snipping tool for Mac that can do a little more, you may need to turn to a third-party developer.

CleanShot X is unbeatable here. The app toolkit is tailored for 50+ different changes, which makes it an ultimate screen capturing tool for Mac. You can use CleanShot X to capture screen — whether it’s a window, full screen, area, or even scrolling content, as well as record video.

An App To Take Screenshots On Mac

While capturing anything on your desktop, you can choose to hide all desktop clutter and disable desktop notifications in one click. Once you have your clean screenshot, open it from the overlay window that pops up, and start editing. You can add annotations, blur specific parts, or draw — CleanShot X will help you customize virtually anything.

A few not-so-obvious yet cool features to mention are self-timer, screenshot pinning, and internal cloud. Want to capture something with a delay? CleanShot X has a self-timer that will help you pick the right moment. If you want your screenshot to be visible on the screen, pin it to desktop. Finally, save your screen captures to the internal CleanShot Cloud and get shareable links in a flash.

If you’re looking for something with a little more emphasis on screen recording, Capto could be the ideal solution for you. In addition to recording video, or just taking a snapshot on Mac, you can also annotate and edit captures via an intuitive iMovie-esque interface.

Capto does wonders for software walkthroughs. And given its strong visual component, it’s also perfect for those with auditory shyness who would rather add captions than a voiceover. Capto’s built-in organizer is pretty helpful for keeping track of your screenshots too.

Mac OS screenshot organization

An App To Take Screenshots On Mac Laptop

If you take a lot of screenshots then you’re probably way too used to your Downloads folder or Desktop being clogged up with images that have filenames like “Screen Shot 2019-XX-XX at 21.36.15”.

Unfortunately, this inelegant and cluttered outcome is the default Mac screenshot shortcut. Not particularly helpful for keeping all of your images in check, especially when macOS is prone to heavily abbreviating filenames.

While it’s possible to use Finder in conjunction with Preview to view all of your caps, that still isn’t a particularly satisfying visual experience. One of the best solutions is Inboard, which functions like a private Pinterest for your desktop and allows you to tag and filter all of your screenshots for later use.

Inboard takes care of the design savvy out there too with a feature that connects your Dribbble account to import all your likes for digestion at a later date.

But even once you’ve solved the question of how to do a screenshot on a Mac, sharing those screenshots with, say, colleagues or friends isn’t necessarily the easiest thing to do.

Rather than emailing files back and forth, or having to upload everything to a public Google Drive, you might consider a solution like Dropshare. As the name suggests, it makes sharing screenshots (and other files) as simple as dropping them into the relevant area.

Dropshare connects with a range of major third-party cloud apps, but you can also lean on proprietary Dropshare Cloud if you prefer, which is helpful if you want to keep your Mac screen capture sharing separate from your other sharing activity.

The future of how to take a screenshot on a Mac

How To Take Screenshot On Apple

As you can see from above, learning how to screenshot on Mac isn’t particularly difficult, and screen capture on Mac is now easier than ever thanks to the addition of a dedicated MacBook screenshot and video capture menu in macOS Mojave.

It’s clear from this new feature that Apple understands the issue of how to print screen on Mac is one that has been, to put it lightly, unintuitive in the past, so you can likely expect to see further tweaks to the process in the future.

In the meantime, there are some excellent options in the snipping tool for Mac market that facilitate the process and offer a range of diverse features you won’t find among those built-in options for taking a screenshot on Mac.

An App To Take Screenshots On Mac Windows 10

Best of all, you can try all the apps mentioned here: CleanShot, Capto, Inboard, and Dropshare absolutely free with a 7-day trial of Setapp, a Mac platform with over 150 essential apps for any task at hand. Now you’re all set for your screenshotting game.

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