this is how you quickly take a screenshot or printscreen

Taking a screenshot (also called a print screen or screenshot) on your Mac is quick and easy, but you have to know the right key combinations. We’ll show you how to take screenshots on your Mac.

How do you take a screenshot on your Mac?

Windows keyboards generally include the obvious ‘Printscreen’ button. It cannot be found on a MacBook or iMac keyboard, but there are special key combinations to take a screenshot. A big advantage of macOS is that you can also capture part of the screen – here’s how:

Screenshot of the entire screen with the key combination “Shift + Cmd +3”

Taking screenshots on your Mac is done by the combination Shift-Cmd-3 to use. You then take a screenshot of the entire screen. You will then find the screenshot on your desktop.

Screenshot of a section of the screen with the key combination: “Shift + Command +4″

Do you only want to save a part of your screen? Then use Shift-Cmd-4. The mouse icon then changes to a cross. Drag this over the part of which you want to take a screenshot, this will create a square. As soon as you let go, a screenshot of your selection will be taken.

Wrong area selected? Then press ‘Esc’ while dragging to stop. Press Shift-Cmd-4 again to select again. Screenshots are automatically saved to your desktop. It is also possible to directly copy the screenshot to the clipboard. To do this, press the key combination and hold down the Control key at the same time. This way you can quickly process screenshots in a document or email.

Want to take a screenshot of one particular window? Then after pressing Shift-Cmd-4, press the spacebar. The cross now turns into a camera. Move the camera icon over the desired window so that it turns blue. Click to take a screenshot. Again, you can press ‘Esc’ to start over.

Screenshot toolbar with the key combination: “Shift + Command + 5″

Since macOS Mojave (version 10.14), there is a third way to take all kinds of screenshots using the screenshot toolbar. Press Shift-Command-5 to open the ‘Screenshot’ utility. This will appear at the bottom of your display.

Here you will see three options with which you can take screenshots, as is also possible with the other two key combinations. You choose from your full screen, a window or a selection. The other two buttons let you take a screenshot.

To close this panel again, press the cross at the bottom or the escape key. Via the Options button in the panel you determine where the screenshots should be saved. You can also set that the screenshot is only taken after five or ten seconds after pressing it, or that the mouse cursor is not visible (or is). If you want to move the toolbar, drag it on the left corner of the screen.

Edit screenshots quickly

When you take a screenshot, a small preview appears at the bottom of the screen by default. Clicking this will allow you to quickly edit the screenshot. This way you can easily add text or annotations to it before it is saved. From here it is also easy to quickly share your screenshot, for example via Mail or a shared folder. If you want to open it in an editing program to edit the image more extensively, you need to open the screenshot from the file location.

Collect screenshots

The screenshots automatically collect on your desktop. Finder gives you a small preview of files, so you can see them briefly before opening them. The so-called ‘Quick Tasks’ allow you to quickly perform actions from Finder, such as rotating a photo or merging multiple files into PDF.

You don’t have to worry that your Mac’s desktop will become full in a short time, because the Stacks function ensures that files are automatically grouped together. In fact, they are folders where, for example, all images, PDFs and other file formats are collected. If you click on such a collection, all files will appear. Handy if you regularly take screenshots.

More Helpful MacBook Tips

Would you like to read more such practical tips for your MacBook? on iPhoned we regularly share tips so that you can get the most out of your Mac. We’ll explain what to do if your MacBook gets hot and we’ll show you how to type emoji and symbols. We also give tips on how to quickly free up space on your MacBook.