Work in multiple spaces on Mac

If the desktop on your Mac gets cluttered with open app windows, you can use Mission Control to create additional desktops, called spaces, to organise the windows. When you work in a space, you see only the windows that are in that space.

Create a space

If you’re working with apps in full screen or Split View, their thumbnails are shown in the Spaces bar.

In the Spaces bar, click the Add button .

You can create up to 16 spaces.

When you’ve finished, click the thumbnail for a space to open it.

Tip: Make your spaces unique by assigning a different desktop picture to each one. Just assign System Preferences to all desktops (see the information about assigning apps below), then change the desktop picture in each space.

Move between spaces

On your Mac, do any of the following:

On a trackpad, swipe left or right with three or four fingers. On a Magic Mouse, swipe with two fingers.

Press the Control key and the Right or Left arrow key.

Enter Mission Control, move the pointer to the top edge of the screen, then click a space in the Spaces bar.

If your Mac has a Touch Bar, you can set an option in Keyboard preferences to show spaces in the Touch Bar. Then just tap a space in the Touch Bar to open the space.

Move an app window from one space to another

On your Mac, do any of the following:

Drag the app window you want to move to the edge of the screen. After a moment, the window moves to the next space.

Go to the space that has the window you want to move, enter Mission Control, then drag the window up to the space you want to use.

If you drag the window onto a full screen app in the Spaces bar, you can use the apps in Split View.

Delete a space

On your Mac, enter Mission Control, then move the pointer to the top edge of the screen.

In the Spaces bar, move the pointer over the space you want to delete, then click the Delete button that appears.

If the space contains open windows, they are moved to another space.

You can quickly stop using an app in full screen or Split View by moving the pointer over the thumbnail in the Space bar, then clicking the Exit button that appears.

Multiple windows on mac

In iOS 13 and later, iPad apps can support multiple windows. For example, in an iPad app that enables document creation, people could have multiple document windows open at the same time.

NOTE To support multiple windows in the Mac version of your iPad app, you must support multiple windows on iPad. For guidance, see Mac Catalyst.

There are several ways people can open a new window. For example:

• Drag an app’s Dock icon to the side of the screen to choose one of its current windows or create a new one
• Drag an object to the side of the screen and drop it onto the system-provided drop target
• Touch and hold an app icon on the Home screen or the Dock, tap Show All Windows in the context menu that appears, and tap the Add (+) button
• Touch and hold an object until it reveals a context menu that includes the option to view the object in a new window

iPad apps typically use two types of windows. A primary window lets people navigate the app’s full hierarchy and access all of the app’s objects and the actions associated with them. An auxiliary window often supports a modal task or contains a single object and the actions associated with it; in both cases, people tend to close an auxiliary window after they’ve completed their work in it. In Mail, for example, the primary window contains all mailboxes and messages, whereas an auxiliary window displays a single message.

Although in most cases you should use a primary window, whether to use an auxiliary window depends largely on the type of content people want to view when they open a new window in your app. Regardless of whether people open a new window by dragging an item to the side of the screen or by choosing an «Open Item in New Window» command, consider the following heuristic.

• If the item is a folder of content, use a primary window.
• If the item is an individual document or file, and people are likely to close the new window when they’re finished interacting with the item, use an auxiliary window.

Make sure an auxiliary window is useful on its own. Auxiliary windows should give people additional views into your app’s content and functionality. Avoid using an auxiliary window merely to provide options or tools that work on content in the primary window.

Use a Done or Close button in an auxiliary window. When a primary window displays a document, the window typically includes a Back button that lets people navigate to a parent view. In contrast, when an auxiliary window displays a document, the Back button should be replaced with a Done or Close button, because people expect to close an auxiliary window when they’re finished working in it.

For developer guidance, see App and Scenes.

The 5 Best Ways to Run Windows on Your Mac

Find out which option best fits you

While macOS is made to run using Mac hardware, it is not the only operating system that can run on a Mac computer.

Plenty of other operating systems, including Window and Linux, will work on a Mac device. That makes the Mac among the most versatile computers you can buy. Here’s what we’d use to install Windows on a Mac.

Boot Camp

Supports Windows 7, 8.1, and 10

Windows runs natively on Mac hardware for best performance

Requires a full Windows license for the initial install.

Cannot run Windows and Mac OS concurrently.

Perhaps the best-known option for running Windows on a Mac is Boot Camp. Included free with your Mac, Boot Camp allows you to install Windows and then choose between Mac and Windows on startup.

Because Boot Camp runs Windows directly on your Mac’s hardware (there is no virtualization or emulation to be performed) Windows can run at the best possible speed your Mac is able to deliver.

Installing Windows on your Mac is no more difficult than installing Windows on a PC. Apple even provides the Boot Camp Assistant to partition the startup drive to make room for Windows as well as to install all the drivers Windows needs for special Apple hardware.

Virtualization

Run both macOS and a guest OS side-by-side.

Not limited to Windows; a large number of guest operating systems are supported.

Performance tuning and customization needed to achieve the best performance.

May impact the performance of your Mac.

Virtualization allows several operating systems to run on computer hardware at the same time. Virtualization abstracts the hardware layer, making it look like each operating system has its own processor, RAM, graphics, and storage.

Virtualization on the Mac makes use of a software layer called a hypervisor to emulate all of the underlying hardware. As a result, the guest operating system running on the virtual machine does not run as fast as in Boot Camp. But unlike Boot Camp, both the Mac operating system and the guest operating system run at the same time.

There are three primary virtualization apps for Mac:

• Parallels: The first to bring virtualization to the Mac. Parallels supports a wide range of guest OS, including Windows, Linux, and Mac.
• VMWare Fusion: Fusion is the Mac virtualization app offered by VMWare — a leader in virtualization tech. Fusion supports the installation of many different operating systems, including Windows, Linux, and macOS.
• VirtualBox: Oracle supports an open source virtualization app known as VirtualBox. This free virtualization app runs on multiple computer systems, including Mac. Like the other virtualization apps, VirtualBox can be used to run many different operating systems, including Windows, Linux, and macOS.

Installing the virtualization apps is similar to any other Mac app. Guest OS may be more involved with some customization required to obtain the best performance. All three apps have lively forums and support services to help with tuning the performance.

Install Windows on your newer Mac using Boot Camp

You can use Boot Camp Assistant to install Windows 10 on your Intel-based Mac.

Newer Mac computers use a streamlined method to install Windows on your Mac. To find out whether your Mac uses this method, see the “Learn more” section in the Apple Support article Install Windows 10 on your Mac with Boot Camp Assistant. If your Mac is an older model that requires an external USB drive, follow the instructions in Install Windows on your older Mac using Boot Camp instead.

What you need

The keyboard and mouse or trackpad that came with your Mac. If they aren’t available, use a USB keyboard and mouse.

A full-installation, 64-bit version of Windows 10 on a disk image (ISO file) or other installation media.

Sufficient free storage space on your startup drive. For information about the amount of free space needed, see the Apple Support Article Install Windows 10 on your Mac with Boot Camp Assistant.

Before you begin

Before you install Windows, make sure you back up important files.

You can use Time Machine or any other method to back up your files. For information about backing up files, see Back up your files with Time Machine and Ways to back up or protect your files.

Perform the installation

On your Mac, do the following steps in order.

Step 1: Check for software updates

Before you install Windows, install all macOS updates.

On your Mac, log in as an administrator, quit all open apps, then log out any other users.

Choose Apple menu > System Preferences, click Software Update, then install all available macOS updates.

If your Mac restarts after installing an update, open Software Update again to install any additional updates.

Step 2: Prepare your Mac for Windows

Boot Camp Assistant prepares your Mac by creating a new partition for Windows named BOOTCAMP and downloading the Boot Camp support software.

Important: If you’re using a Mac notebook computer, connect it to a power source before continuing.

On your Mac, open Boot Camp Assistant , located in /Applications/Utilities.

At the Introduction screen, click Continue.

The system is checked for total available disk space. Older Time Machine snapshots and cached iCloud files are removed to make space for Boot Camp. This process may take a long time to complete (you can click the Stop button to skip this process).

If you have only one internal disk, choose the Windows ISO image, specify the partition size by dragging the divider between the macOS and Windows partitions, then click Install.

Important: You can’t resize the partition later.

If you have multiple internal disks, follow the onscreen instructions to select and format the disk you want to install Windows on and to choose the Windows ISO image.

If you select your startup disk: You can create an additional partition for Windows. Specify the partition size by dragging the divider between the macOS and Windows partitions.

If you select an APFS-formatted disk: You can either create an additional partition on the disk for Windows, or erase the entire disk and create a partition for Windows. If you choose to create an additional partition, specify the partition size by dragging the divider between the macOS and Windows partitions.

If you select a non-APFS-formatted disk: You can erase the entire disk and create a partition for Windows.

If Boot Camp is already present on the disk you select, you also have the option to uninstall it.

Important: You can’t resize the partition later.

When this step is complete, the Windows installer starts.

Step 3: Install Windows

In the Windows installer, follow the onscreen instructions.

When the installation is finished, your Mac automatically restarts using Windows.

Follow the onscreen instructions to set up Windows.

Step 4: Install Boot Camp on Windows

After installing Windows, Boot Camp drivers that support your Mac hardware start installing.

Note: If the support software doesn’t install automatically, you need to install it manually. For instructions, see the Apple Support article If the Boot Camp installer doesn’t open after using Boot Camp Assistant.

In the Boot Camp installer in Windows, follow the onscreen instructions.

Important: Do not click the Cancel button in any of the installer dialogs.

If a message appears that says the software you’re installing has not passed Windows Logo testing, click Continue Anyway.

You don’t need to respond to installer dialogs that appear only briefly during installation, but if a dialog asks you to install device software, click Install.

If nothing appears to be happening, there may be a hidden window that you must respond to. Look behind open windows.

When the installation is complete, click Finish.

After your Mac restarts, follow the instructions for any other installers that appear.