Written by
Connie Yang
Summary: An overview of the Apple menu on a Mac. This post tells you where the Apple menu is on a MacBook Pro/Air and what items it contains. Besides, tell you the differences between the Apple menu and the Apple menu bar on Mac.
In this post, you'll get full learning of the Apple menu on your Mac and its hidden functions.
Where is the Apple menu on Mac?
The Apple menu on a MacBook Air or MacBook Pro is a drop-down menu featuring a version of the Apple logo. It locates in the upper left corner of your screen.
Whether you use a MacBook Air, MacBook Pro, Mac mini, or others, the Apple menu is designed in the same place on your computer.
The functions of the Apple menu on Mac
Apple menu contains information about your Mac machine, System Preferences, your recently used apps, documents, or so, the buttons to sleep, restart, or shut down your Mac, and others. It gives great convenience to every user and simplifies their work with the Mac.
Here's the list of items in the Apple menu on Mac and their functions.
About This Mac
Open About This Mac in the Apple menu, you can learn detailed information about your Mac, including the release date, current macOS version, the processor, the amount of memory, startup disk, hardware and software report, the storage space usage and management of the internal hard drive and optimization, and others.
System Preferences
System Preferences offers users an entrance to different panes to modify the system settings on Mac. In System Preferences, you can set languages, time zone, passwords for logging into your Mac, Bluetooth connections, network, Time Machine, keyboard, Trackpad, etc.
Also, you can turn on Mac Dark Mode and update your Mac in the Apple menu > System Preferences.
App Store
App Store allows you to discover and download your favorite or wanted apps. And when any updates of your installed apps are available, it will give you a hint to make updates.
Recent Items
When you move your cursor on Recent Items in the Apple menu, you can find the items you've opened or used recently.
Recent Items saves the names of your recently launched apps, documents, and servers to the list. Therefore, you won't need to search for these items in Finder but can re-access them quickly in the future.
The number of items you want to show up in the list of Recent Items is editable. You can choose Apple menu > System Preferences > General. And at the bottom of the General pane, set the number of items you prefer to show up in the Recent Items.
Force Quit
Force Quit enables you to close the app that not responding and can't be quit by clicking the exit button ( ) at the top left corner of the window.
Also, you can press the Option-Command-Esc key together to launch the Force Quit window.
Sleep, Restart, Shut Down
You can press the Sleep button to let your Mac into Sleep Mode. This is to dim the screen and keep your Mac in the state as it is in work condition with less power consumption.
The Restart option allows your Mac to turn off and then automatically start up in a brief time.
If you want to close your Mac completely, click the Shut Down button.
Lock Screen
Lock Screen brings your Mac to the login screen, helping you protect your Mac data and privacy information when you want to leave for a while.
Log Out
Clicking Log Out will help you close all applications and exit the current user account. You can also check in the Reopen Windows when logging back in.
It is convenient for shared users to use the same Mac machine.
Come on to tell your friends the functionalities of the Apple menu on Mac.
Apple menu vs Apple menu bar on Mac
Some of you may be confused about the two. Their names are similar but they work differently.
The Apple menu is in the Apple menu bar, located at the top left corner of the screen and the far left of the Apple menu bar.
Apple menu is a drop-down menu that contains About This Mac, System Preferences, App Store, Recent Items, Force Quit, Sleep, Restart, Shut Down, Lock Screen, and Log Out options.
But the Apple menu bar stays at the top of your Mac screen and runs an entire horizontal area. It contains the Apple menu, menus of the currently opened app, status menu, Spotlight, Control Centre, and Notification Centre.
If the drop-down menus of your Apple menu or other items on the Apple menu bar are not working, you can find solutions from this article.
Bonus: add a right-click enhancer to improve working efficiency on Mac
Although Apple supplies the Apple menu and Apple menu bar to help you work conveniently, that's not enough. To enhance your operation experience on Mac, you also need to combine the control-click dropdown menu, which provides some additional features.
However, the frequent-use control-click menu only contains limited options. If you want to greatly enhance your work experience on Mac, a right-click enhancer is necessary.
iBoysfot MagicMenu is such a powerful utility. It is designed to allow you to personalize the control-click menu on Mac and offers the extra functionalities that the control-click doesn't have.
Once you download, install and launch it on your Mac, you can:
- Add new file types to your control-click menu for quick creation whenever you want.
- Set to move files to the target destination through right-clicking rather than the traditional selecting and dragging.
- Copy and paste items to the target folder or drive with the Copy To feature in the control-click menu.
- Add frequent-use apps, disks, folders, browsers, and websites to the right-click control panel for later quick access instead of from Finder.
Share this advanced right-click enhancer with more people to improve their working efficiency on Mac.
