How to take screenshots on your Mac

Screenshots can be really handy. You can use them to show your grandparent how to use a new app. You can use them to send a shot of that strange error message to your company’s IT department. You can use them to capture tweets before they disappear down the deletion black hole. So in case you need to capture a screenshot or two, here’s a quick and simple guide to taking screenshots on your Mac.

Since the Mojave version of macOS, Macs come with an app that saves your screenshots as PNG files. Press Shift-Command (⌘)-5 to get a command bar at the bottom of the screen.

Press Shift-Command (⌘)-5 to get a command bar at the bottom of the screen.

If you’re in a hurry and don’t want to deal with the command bar, you can still save screenshots to your desktop.

Update May 2nd, 2023, 4:10PM ET: This article was originally published on July 23rd, 2020, and has been updated to account for changes in the OS.

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