Use Multi-Touch gestures on Mac

With a Multi-Touch trackpad or Magic Mouse, you can tap, swipe, pinch, or spread one or more fingers to perform useful actions.

Trackpad gestures

These gestures require a Magic Trackpad or built-in Multi-Touch trackpad. If your trackpad supports Force Touch, you can also Force click and get haptic feedback.

For more information about these gestures, choose System Settings (or System Preferences) from the Apple menu , then click Trackpad. There you can turn a gesture off, change the type of gesture, and learn which gestures work with your Mac.

Hand performing the "tap to click" gesture on a Mac trackpad.

Tap to click

Tap with one finger to click.

Hand demonstrating a Multi-Touch gesture on a Mac trackpad.

Secondary click (right-click)

Click or tap with two fingers.

Hand using two fingers on a Mac trackpad to demonstrate multi-touch gestures.

Smart zoom

Double-tap with two fingers to zoom in and back out of a webpage or PDF.

Two fingers scrolling up on a Mac trackpad.

Scroll

Slide two fingers up or down to scroll.1

Hand performing a two-finger rotation gesture on a Mac trackpad.

Zoom in or out

Pinch with two fingers to zoom in or out.

Hand using two fingers to perform the rotate gesture on a Mac trackpad.

Rotate

Move two fingers around each other to rotate a photo or other item.

Two fingers rotating on a Mac trackpad, illustrating the rotate gesture.

Swipe between pages

Swipe left or right with two fingers to show the previous or next page.

Hand performing a two-finger swipe gesture on a trackpad.

Open Notification Center

Swipe left from the right edge with two fingers to show Notification Center.

Hand performing the three-finger drag gesture on a Mac trackpad.

Three finger drag

Use three fingers to drag items on your screen, then click or tap to drop. Turn on this feature in Accessibility settings.

Hand performing a Multi-Touch gesture on a Mac trackpad, illustrating trackpad functionality.

Look up and data detectors

Tap with three fingers to look up a word or take actions with dates, addresses, phone numbers, and other data.

Hand performing a multi-touch gesture on a Mac trackpad.

Show desktop

Spread your thumb and three fingers apart to show your desktop.

Hand using a trackpad to perform a Multi-Touch gesture.

Apps

Pinch your thumb and three fingers together to show your installed apps.

Hand performing a four-finger swipe up on a Mac trackpad to open Mission Control.

Mission Control

Swipe up with four fingers2 to open Mission Control.

Hand performing a trackpad gesture on a Mac.

App Exposé

Swipe down with four fingers2 to see all windows of the app you're using.

Hand using a trackpad to perform a multi-touch gesture on a Mac.

Swipe between full-screen apps

Swipe left or right with four fingers2 to move between desktops and full-screen apps.

Magic Mouse gestures

These gestures require a Magic Mouse, and Magic Mouse models with a USB-C port require macOS Sequoia 15.1 or later.

For more information about these gestures, choose System Settings (or System Preferences) from the Apple menu , then click Mouse. There you can turn a gesture off, change the type of gesture, and learn which gestures work with your Mac.

 Secondary click (right-click)

Secondary click (right-click)

Click the right side of the mouse.

Scroll

Scroll

Slide one finger up or down to scroll.1

 Smart zoom

Smart zoom

Double-tap with one finger to zoom in and back out of a webpage or PDF.

 Mission Control

Mission Control

Double-tap with two fingers to open Mission Control.

Image depicting Magic Mouse gestures.

Swipe between full-screen apps

Swipe left or right with two fingers to move between desktops and full-screen apps.

 Swipe between pages

Swipe between pages

Swipe left or right with one finger to show the previous or next page.

Need more help?

Tell us more about what's happening, and we’ll suggest what you can do next.

Get suggestions

  1. You can turn off trackpad scrolling in Accessibility settings.

  2. In some versions of macOS, this gesture uses three fingers instead of four.

Published Date: