Mac 101: Force Quit

If you're switching from Windows you may be familiar with an old friend, the Task Manager. Apple provides a similar tool, with an easy way to force unruly applications to quit. I'll get to why you'd want to do this in a moment. To access Force Quit, you can either go to the Apple menu in the top left corner of your screen, and choose Force Quit... Alternately, you can press three keys at once: Command + Option + Esc.* It's sort of the Mac version of Ctrl-Alt-Delete.

Why would you want to force an application to quit? Sometimes applications get "stuck" for whatever reason and can't recover. If you notice the "rainbow wheel" spinning when you try to access the application and it just won't do anything, check the Force Quit tool and see if the name of the application is red and there's a parenthetical warning "not responding." This is your cue to use Force Quit -- just be aware that sometimes an application might not be responding, but might still be "alive." Typically what I do is go grab a cup of coffee, or stretch, and give the app 2-5 minutes to get itself together. If it is still stuck, I force quit.

For more on Force Quit, check out this Apple tips article on "Knowing When to (Force) Quit." And knowing is half the battle.

*Fixed, thanks to the handy commenters!

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If you're switching from Windows you may be familiar with an old friend, the Task Manager. Apple provides a similar tool, with an easy way...

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Glen

Victor,
Oops, I am sorry didn't mean to confuse any readers. I love TUAW but have never posted before. I will be more conscience of things with future posts.

Thanks, and keep up the great work!

July 15 2009 at 12:28 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

Glen

For 3rd party software like Microsoft Office

:P

July 14 2009 at 12:08 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

Glen

I think that "Activity Monitor" is a little closer to the "Task Manager" in Windows. It is found in the /Applications/Utilities folder. This has more than just Applications running but also active processes and memory use.

For closing Applications the "Force Quit" option may be the easiest way to do it. You can also force quit an app by holding the alt/option key and clicking the dock icon and holding the mouse button down. a list should show up next to or above the icon (depending on where your dock is located) releasing and repressing the alt/option key will toggle the bottom option between "quit" and "force quit"

In instances where the "Force Quit" option does not work sufficiently, you can take a look at "Activity Monitor"

July 14 2009 at 12:02 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

1 reply to Glen's comment

Victor Agreda, Jr.

It is, but Activity Monitor is a little scary for our 101 readers :)
Maybe 202 ;)

July 14 2009 at 5:52 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

Drifter71

She's always trolling here. The programs that most often hang is Microsoft Office. Ironic...

July 14 2009 at 11:12 AM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

Chris

Unfortunately, however stable Mac OS is, some programs still hang. The blessing of OSX for me is not only that Force Quit lets you choose one program to quit easily, but also that 9/10 times the selected application quits immediately!
A real blessing since, for me, Windows pretty much never did that.

July 14 2009 at 4:57 AM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

deluded spider

Oh grow up. :P

July 14 2009 at 3:44 AM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

Joseph

because this just goes to show that force quitting "just works." also, the fact that you can quit 1 app and not bring the OS to it's knees is nice. Windows 7 should have some of that now. The game is back one. Welcome Troll. Enjoy your meal.

July 14 2009 at 1:49 AM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

matthew

CMD+OPT+Shift+ESC...hold for three seconds or so...no need for the force quit prompt.

July 13 2009 at 10:44 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

(01)

Trolling on TUAW? Nice.

Anyway, anyone who thinks that apps don't crash on Macs is just fooling themselves. It's true that it occurs less than in a Windows environment, but it does happen. I usually go to task manager to get a better idea of what's going on, but handy tip.

July 13 2009 at 6:09 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

Oboewan

Remember: On iPhone OS 1.x.x or 2.x.x, to do this, hold down Home until the app quits.
On 3.x.x, hold down Lock until you see the shutdown screen, then hold down Home until the app quits.
The reason they changed it is because of VC on the 3GS.
This is very useful for clearing out the RAM-hog that is Safari.

July 13 2009 at 3:52 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply