Show Hidden Files On Mac App
Basically, for the security of the macOS, Apple has hidden many macOS files on Mac by default. And there are other occasions that people want to hide files, avoiding being found by other users who use the Mac unexpectedly. And some people even tell me that they often need to show the hidden files on Mac, and when finish the task, they need to hide them again. Interesting! Here in the following, i’m going to tell you the 3 ways you need to know how to show hidden files on Mac, fully useful for High Sierra and Mojave. Let’s start!!!
- Find Hidden Files On Mac
- Show Hidden Files On Mac Apps
- Show Hidden Files Mac Application
- Show Hidden Files On Mac Os Mojave
- Show Hide Hidden Files Mac App
Method #1. Show Hidden Files on Mac with Shortcut
Find Hidden Files On Mac
If your macOS is High Sierra or the latest macOS Mojave, then you can show hidden files on Mac with the Shortcut in the Finder: 'CMD + Shift +.'. It is also the shortcut to hide files on Mac.
Method #2. Show Hidden Files on Mac with Terminal Command
Besides using the show hidden files on Mac with a shortcut, you can also try to show hidden files on Mac with the Terminal Command by following the steps below:
Step 1. Click Finder > Applications > Utilities to open the Terminal found.
Show Hidden Files On Mac Apps
If you are looking for an app to show hidden files on mac so funter 4.1 is best app to use. Funter 4.1 Mac (Hidden Files App) Below you can download funter 4.1 which show hidden files for mac. If Download Link Does Not Work, Please Inform Us In The Comment Box Below! The easiest way to show hidden files is to use the free Funterapplication. Funter allows you to find, hide and search for hidden files on your Mac in just a few clicks. Follow these steps to see hidden files on Mac: Launch Funter to manage hidden files. The Quickest Way to Show/Hide Hidden Files Since the release of macOS Sierra, when in Finder, it is now possible to use the shortcut: CMD + SHIFT +. Press once to show hidden files and again to hide them. Feb 19, 2019 Overview Show Hidden Files or ShowHiddenFiles (was ChangeVisibility) enables you to change the visibility flag for files in all versions of OS X. It's easy to use, with a simple GUI. Much easier than using Terminal if you have to change file and folder visibility frequently.
Step 2. In Terminal, type in or copy-n-paste the following: defaults write com.apple.finder AppleShowAllFiles YES
Step 3. Press Return
Step 4. Hold the ‘Option key, then right click on the Finder icon in the dock and click Relaunch. It will show the hidden files on Mac right away. To hide the files again, type in or paste the command line: defaults write com.apple.finder AppleShowAllFiles NO
Method #3. Show Hidden Files on Mac App Software to Show All Files
Even you’ve tried Method #1 and Method #2, sometime you even can’t show the the hidden files on Mac, especially some files you hide deliberately. In this case, it is very necessary to have a show hidden files app for Mac. In this article, I’d like to recommend you try iBeesoft Data Recovery for Mac. It is a great tool which will scan your Mac for all the files you’ve hidden or lost, displaying them in front of your eyes. It can also recover deleted files on Mac and external dirves
Your Safe & Best Mac File Display Software
- The show hidden files Mac application is fully compatible with all the macOS, including the ones most Mac users are using, High Sierra and Mojave.
- The Mac application supports to show hidden files on Mac, including documents, photos, videos, audio files, emails, other types of files as well.
- Besides show hidden files, it allows you to preview and save files to anywhere you want them to be on your Mac.
Let’s see how to show hidden files Mac application works!
Click the download button to get the installation package of the file display Mac software. After then, install it on your Mac. After install the software, you can switch back to the former ones.
Step 1. Select file types to scan
Launch the show hidden files applications for Mac. From the first window, you need to select the file types to scan. Please confirm the hidden file types first, then select the corresponding file type(s). If you’re not sure what types of files you’re going to show, please keep all the file types selected and click 'Start' to show hidden files Mac.
Step 2. Select hard drive to scan
From the next window, you can see all partitions are displayed for you. Please select the one on which you want to show hidden files on Mac. External hard drives are supported as well. Click 'Scan' to start the process
Step 3. Preview and show hidden files
It takes a while for the best Mac data recovery software to scan for hidden files on Mac. During the scanning process, you can stop the process as you like if you’ve seen it has found the files for you. When it finished, you can select files to preview. If they’re the hidden files, select them to save in a folder on your Mac. It’s very helpful for manage these files.
Best FTP client for Mac
When you look at your desktop, or inside any folder for that matter, on your Mac you’ll see a number (one that will vary depending on how well-organized you are) of file and folder icons. What all of us have in common, however, is a huge range of system files that are hidden just out of view.
Easy way to show hidden files
Try Setapp to make all your files visible on a Mac. With the tools we offer, nothing gets lost in the shuffle.
Those of us who have lived online for long enough will remember the Delete System32 hoax, with which trolls encouraged naive PC users to delete their Windows 2000 system directory. It’s not a shock that, since those days, developers have taken more care to hide away files that are essential to their operating systems.
There are, however, times when you need to access those files. Most of them are hidden away in the ~/Library folder, but the truth is that the average Mac holds a treasure trove of files and folders that you either no longer need or may want to access for troubleshooting purposes.
Is it normal that 'System' takes up 90GB+ of storage? What does it contain? How to get your System folder under control?
Three Ways to See Hidden Files on Mac
There’s good news for anyone out there who’s looking to access hidden files on their Mac: you can do exactly that, in a number of different ways, by arming yourself with a little bit of knowledge. There are a couple of Finder augmentation and replacement apps, for example, that make the process as easy as clicking a single button.
Before kicking off, however, it’s important to highlight that you should play it safe when digging through hidden files on your laptop or desktop. Unless you know exactly what you’re looking for you can do some serious damage to your operating system, so you’ll want to proceed with caution. After all, these files are hidden for a reason!
See hidden files on Mac via Finder
As mentioned above, it doesn’t take much to make the hidden files on your Mac visible. In fact, you can check out all of the hidden files on your Mac by following just three easy steps:
- In Finder, open up your Macintosh HD folder
- Press Command+Shift+Dot
- Your hidden files will become visible. Repeat step 2 to hide them again!
This process will also work elsewhere, including your Documents or Applications folders. However, if you know what you’re looking for is in your ~/Library folder and would rather jump straight into that then you can take the following steps instead:
- In Finder, hold down Alt and click Go at the top of your screen
- Click on Library to open up the, normally hidden, folder
Be prepared for one very cluttered looking Desktop if you decide to uncover all the hidden files there. If you’re anything like the average Mac user, most of what you’ll find will be made up of system files and autosaved Microsoft Word documents!
Some users have reported success finding documents that they thought were lost forever after their Mac crashed without saving, which is always a useful tip to have in the back pocket.
Unhide files on Mac with Terminal commands
Terminal, a Mac command-line interface, is included in macOS by default and allows you to use command prompts to control your Mac instead of following a potentially complex series of instructions to do the same thing in Finder.
If you’re already familiar with using Terminal, then you might prefer to run the following script to reveal your hidden files:
- Open Terminal
- Enter the following: defaults write com.apple.Finder AppleShowAllFiles true [Press Return] killall Finder
- To hide files again, change the “true” in the step above to “false”
It doesn’t matter too much whether you use Terminal or Finder to make the hidden files on your Mac visible, though you might prefer the latter if you’ve never run scripts on Terminal before, as both routes accomplish the same thing.
One reason you might opt to use Terminal is that it allows you to hide any file or folder on your Mac, which is a great way to avoid that sense of residual curiosity felt by others should they come across a password protected .rar on your desktop! To hide files, just:
- Open Terminal
- Enter the following: chflags hidden [Press Space]
- Drag files or folders to be hidden from Finder into the Terminal window, which will display their paths in Terminal
- Press Return to hide
To make your files visible again, just repeat the above steps using “chflags nohidden” in place of “chflags hidden.” Of course, the fact that anyone else who knows this trick can also use it to unhide your files means that this isn’t an adequate substitute for other security measures.
Use file managers to access hidden files
How to find the path of a file in Mac? Apps like DCommander and Forklift, both of which perform like native macOS apps and function as extensions of Finder, represent great choices if you’re at all uncomfortable using Terminal or digging around in your ~/Library folder.
Because these apps allow you to make hidden files and folders visible (or invisible) using shortcuts or clicking buttons within the apps, they make the whole process incredibly simple. In Forklift, for example, you can show hidden files by:
- Clicking View
- Selecting View Options towards the bottom of the dropdown menu
- Checking the box next to Show Hidden Files
There’s also a button in the toolbar to show and hide hidden files. DCommander has a similar function available, with a Show System Files command, but you need to add it manually to the app’s toolbar:
As you might guess from those subtle differences in terminology, we would suggest that Forklift is more suitable for someone looking for something that really looks and acts like Finder. DCommander, with a larger range of features and toolbar buttons enabled by default, is still intuitive but feels a little more dense.
Whichever you settle on remember that just because these apps make accessing hidden files easy it doesn’t mean that you can’t do some real damage if you start messing around with the wrong thing!
Thank you for this opportunity to respond to your comment. I just downloaded Graph from the Mac App Store and exercised it and it works as intended. Getting back to your specific comment, I am baffled. Sincerely, Ed. The only way to address your concerns, and others like it, is if you contact [email protected] so that we may determine how to proceed.
Try all these apps for free
Get a huge set of top apps for keeping your Mac in shape. Best utilities in one pack, give it a go!
Leave hidden files to automatic cleanup
For some Mac users, the question of how to see hidden files is nothing more than succumbing to curiosity. For others, it’s a necessity for troubleshooting a piece of software or device that’s not performing as it should.
Somewhere in between are those in the pursuit of a few spare gigabytes as their hard drive rapidly fills up. If you’re one of those people looking to clean up useless hidden data then an app like CleanMyMac X might be exactly what you need:
Show Hidden Files Mac Application
- Open up the app and select Smart Scan
- Hit Scan
- Select Review Details underneath Cleanup to see how much System Junk you can safely delete
- Hit Run to remove those unneeded files
Show Hidden Files On Mac Os Mojave
An app like CleanMyMac X will free up space just as effectively, probably more so, than you’ll be able to by randomly deleting hidden files and hoping for the best. If you do end up going this route then don’t consider learning more about hidden content a waste of time — at least you know what to watch out for if someone tries to troll you into deleting vital system files!
Show Hide Hidden Files Mac App
Best of all, DCommander, Forklift, and CleanMyMac X apps mentioned above are all available for a free trial through Setapp, a collection of more than 150 macOS apps from top developers all over the world.