Press the power button and click on the Restart button in the dialog box that appears on the screen.Mac users have three options how to perform a system restart: What’s even worse, they might freeze your entire operating system, leaving you with only one option how to solve the situation: restart your Mac. How to Restart Your MacĮven when you know how to force quit on a Mac, some apps might still be impossible to close.

The application name usually corresponds to what’s written in the title bar of the unresponsive app, but some applications, such as Terminal itself, use the title bar to display other information. Launch Terminal, type in the command, and hit the enter key. If you’re not afraid of working with Terminal, you can use it to force quit any application with a simple command: killall. This option works identically to all the other methods how to force quit a program on Mac computer that are described in this article. In that situation, what you need to do is hold the command key while right-clicking on the icon of the unresponsive app to invoke an alternative menu with the option to force quit the app. But when you’re dealing with an unresponsive app, the Quit option seldom works. When you click on this option, the app closes. Normally, when you right-click on an app icon in the Dock, you see the Quit option. If it doesn’t, something is seriously wrong, and you need to restart your computer. The app should stop as soon as you click on the button. Click on its name and then click on the “Quit Process” button in the upper-left corner of the Activity Monitor app window. Among these processes should be the app that you want to force quit. You want to focus on the left section, which lists all active processes. The Activity Monitor app itself is divided into several sections. Alternatively, you can also click on Spotlight and type “activity monitor” in the search field. To open Activity Monitor, go to the Finder and navigate to Applications → Utilities → Activity Monitor. A nearly identical tool is also present on all Mac computers, and its name is Activity Monitor. Those of you who are familiar with the Windows operating system are probably used to force quitting misbehaving apps using Task Manager, which is a system monitor and startup manager included with Microsoft Windows systems. Force Quit Mac Apps Using Activity Monitor

Just make sure to release the buttons as soon as the app disappears because you might accidentally kill more apps than you intended to and lose important data. If, for some reason, you can’t leave the app you want to force quit, you can hold down the Cmd+Alt+Shift+Esc buttons to close whichever app you’re currently in. Press Command-Option-Esc to invoke the Force Quit window.The lazier among us can use the force quit command Mac to invoke the Force Quit window with a keyboard shortcut. Select the name of the app you want to force quit in the Force Quit window.Choose Force Quit from the Apple menu to invoke the Force Quit window.Force Quit Mac Apps Using the Apple Menuįorce quitting Mac apps using the Apple menu is the official method how Apple advises users to deal with unresponsive apps. This article covers a host of different ways how to force quit unresponsive Mac apps to help you regain control over your computer.įor such a stable operating system as macOS, users can choose from surprisingly many ways how to force quit a program on Mac computers. Unfortunately, many third-party Mac applications don’t offer nearly the same reliability as the operating system itself, causing many Mac users to wonder how to force quit a program on Mac that has stopped responding. Among many other things, Macs are known for their excellent reliability, which is why so many professional and regular computer users couldn’t imagine life without them.

Mac force quit window