You can also drag-and-drop an application’s icon to the trash can icon on your dock. Or, open the Launchpad interface and drag-and-drop an application’s icon to the trash can from there. Most applications will go straight to your trash, and you can then Control-click or right-click the trash can icon on your dock and select “Empty Trash” to get rid of that application and all the other files you’ve deleted.

1. Can Drag My Mac App To Trash Box
2. Trash Can Mac Pro
3. Can Drag My Mac App To Trash Truck
4. Mac Trash Can Computer
5. How To Empty Trash Mac
6. Can't Drag App To Trash Mac

Opening, closing, organizing and installing. Managing apps on a Mac is different to Windows, but it’s very simple. If you’re at all unsure check out this guide for some top tips.

When you’re new to Mac computers one of the first things you’ll notice is how apps are managed differently. Generally speaking, most things are more straight-forward; although it might not seem that way at first glance.

There’s no start menu anymore, but instead there’s a row of icons at the bottom of the screen. The ‘X’ button has moved to the left and into a red circle, but it doesn’t even close the app properly.

In this post I’ll explain all the basics of how to manage apps on a Mac. Including my favorite shortcuts to make even experienced Mac-users more productive than ever.

Contents

• 1 Opening Apps on a Mac
• 3 Organizing Apps on a Mac
• 4 Installing and Uninstalling Apps

Related Posts:

Opening Apps on a Mac

Opening Apps with Spotlight

I believe this is the quickest and easiest way to launch any application on your Mac.

Spotlight is a macOS feature that lets you search your machine for almost anything: documents, photos, contact details, directions, web pages. And applications.

Open Spotlight by pressing cmd+space and start typing the app you want to open. When Spotlight finds it—usually after only a few letters—hit enter to launch the app.

Can Drag My Mac App To Trash Box

Quick, easy, and accessible whatever you’re doing on the Mac.

Opening Apps with the Dock

Usually found at the bottom of your Mac screen is a colorful row of app icons. This is the Dock and it’s probably the most common way of opening apps on a Mac.

The main section of the Dock shows your favorite apps, which are easy to customize. To the right you’ll see a divider with a few recently used applications, and then stacks of documents and the Trash.

To launch an app from the Dock just click its icon and watch it bounce up and down while the app opens.

Opening Apps with Launchpad

Launchpad is an app to open other apps. Its iOS-style full-screen display makes it easier to find the specific application you’re looking for.

Open Launchpad using either of the two methods above or press the grid-like shortcut button on your keyboard or Touch Bar. If that isn’t good enough, pinch together with your thumb and three fingers on the trackpad.

With Launchpad open, click any app icon to open it. Otherwise click the background, press esc, or pinch your fingers out to close Launchpad.

Opening Apps in Finder

Trash Can Mac Pro

Finder is the blue-and-white face on the left side of the Dock. It’s what you’ll use to navigate or organize files and folders on a Mac.

Click the Finder icon to open a new window, then either click the Applications shortcut or press cmd+A to open the Applications folder and view your Mac apps. Double-click any of these apps to open them.

You could also use this opportunity to drag your favorites apps onto the Dock.

Closing Apps on a Mac

When an app is open you’ll see three colored circles at the top left of the window; if you don’t see them hover your mouse in the top left corner of the screen and they should appear.

The red circle will close this window but it won’t necessarily close the app. This is because you may have multiple windows of that app. Or it could be because it’s beneficial for that app to run in the background, such as Mail or Messages.

To close an app completely, make sure it’s your active application—by looking at the Menu Bar—and press cmd+Q. To make a different app active, follow any of the steps for opening applications on a Mac.

Alternatively, you can click the app’s name in the Menu Bar and select the Quit [Application] option.

Organizing Apps on a Mac

Organizing Apps on the Dock

The largest section of the Dock holds your favorite apps and can be easily customized.

Click and drag app icons to any position or drop them into the Trash to Remove from Dock. When an app is removed from the Dock it hasn’t been deleted from your Mac and can still be opened using any of the other methods.

You can drag icons from the recently used section to your favorites to make them permanently accessible. Or open the Applications folder in Finder and drag any other apps onto the Dock.

You can now add, rearrange, or remove Dock icons to your liking.

Organizing Apps in LaunchPad

Just like the Dock, you can click and drag app icons in Launchpad to wherever you want them. However, in Launchpad you’re also able to create folders or move apps to new pages.

Move an app to a new page by dragging it to the edge of the screen. Create a folder by dropping one app on top of another. You can then rename the folder by clicking its name and typing something new, like ‘Productivity’ or ‘Games’.

There are countless ways to organize your apps in Launchpad: alphabetically, color-coded, or by categories. It’s up to you.

Installing and Uninstalling Apps

Installing Apps on a Mac

The easiest way to install apps is with the Mac App Store. Search for the app you’re looking, click install, and enter your password.

However, if the app you wants isn’t available on the Mac App Store, you can still install it using either a download or an installation disc. To do so, download the app from a website or insert the disc and double-click the disk image that appears.

The disk image will either have an app installer for you to open and follow or a copy of the app to drag into your Applications folder.

Occasionally macOS will refuse to run an application from unidentified developers. If you’re certain the app is safe, you can bypass this by control-clicking the app in Finder and selecting Open.

Uninstalling Apps on a Mac

Uninstalling applications on a Mac can seem tricky at times but it’s really rather simple.

Open the Applications folder in Finder and locate the app you want to uninstall. If there is an Uninstaller, open that and follow the prompts. Otherwise, drag the app icon into the Trash on your Dock.

That’s it.

Alternatively, for Mac App Store apps you can click and hold on the icon in Launchpad and click the ‘X’ button that appears.

When an app is uninstalled, your Mac will keep your preferences just in case you ever wish to use that app again. These preferences files are usually tiny and hidden away, so you don’t need to worry about removing them.

Hopefully that gives you a solid grounding in how to manage apps on a Mac. If you’ve still got questions or want us to do some other beginner guides, let us know in the comments!

Dan is a freelance writer based in South West England.

He spent two years supervising repairs as a Genius Admin for Apple Retail and uses that knowledge to keep our troubleshooting guides up to date.

Long before that, Dan turned to Apple products from a musical background. Having owned iPods for years, he bought a MacBook to learn sound recording and production. It was using those skills that he gained a first-class Bachelor of Science in Sound Technology.

Q: App won't delete from Launchpad, how to fix?

'I have an app that I can't delete. It is a program purchased from the App Store. Even though I have deleted the software from my Applications file, the app won't delete from Launchpad. And dragging to the trash does not work either. Do you guys have this problem?'

Too many applications installed on your Mac can make it slowly to find out what you need, and most importantly, they can eat up limited storage space. When you want to remove futile programs on your Mac, you can delete them from Launchpad or Finder. However, some stubborn Mac software, like that comes with the operating system, can be tricky to remove. Here's how to uninstall Mac apps that will help to make space on Mac and improve its performance.

There are many other hot topics related to apps, one of which is 'The application is not open anymore'.

Can Drag My Mac App To Trash Truck

How to Delete Apps from Launchpad or Finder on Mac

Uninstalling unused Mac applications is one of the ways that frequently used by users to deal with low disk space issues and speed up Mac computer. And it can be done from the Finder or Launchpad.

To Uninstall Programs from the Finder:

Open Finder, go to the 'Applications' folder, drag the selected program you want to uninstall to the 'Trash' folder, finally open 'Trash' folder and select 'Empty' option.

To Uninstall Programs from Launchpad:

Open Launchpad, hold down an app's icon until they start to jiggle, click on the delete button x. Some apps don't show an X button using this way. If you need to remove this kind of software, skip to solution to app won't delete from Launchpad.

Mac Can't Delete App Because It's Open

When you delete an app in Finder, one possible scenario is that there is a message on the screen reading 'The item 'app name' can't be moved to the trash because it's open.' This occurs because the app is still processing in the background, and you haven't closed it thoroughly. Follow the steps to shut it down properly and get it removed for good.

1. Open the Finder and select 'Applications' from the Favorites list.

2. Click on 'Utilities' > 'Activity Monitor'.

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3. Find the app you want to delete. You can type search the app in the search bar.

4. Select the app. Click on the X in the upper left corner of the window. Click 'Quit' to end the process. After this, you can uninstall the app on your Mac in the Finder.

How to Delete Apps on Mac That Won't Delete

If you need to uninstall software built-into the system, the above two ways won't be useful. When you are trying to delete Safari, Mail, Face Time, or other default apps with Finder, you'll get a message saying: 'Safari.app can't be modified or deleted because it's required by Mac OS X.' Then, can you force delete an app on Mac? How to delete an app on Mac that won't delete? Two practical methods are introduced below, the first is automatic and simple with a Mac maintenance utility, and the second is more complex.

Uninstall App Won't Delete from Launchpad Easily

If you are proficient in technology, using Terminal might help you to delete system-embedded applications. But for most ordinary users, we highly recommend you try a simpler way to delete default apps by using EaseUS Mac CleanGenius. This program enables you to remove any app with its corresponding files and preferences in one-click without destroying your system. It also provides ultimate Mac cleaning features, such as cleaning junk files, deleting duplicate files from the computer like music, documents, pictures, videos, etc.

Note: EaseUS Mac CleanGenius is compatible with Mac OS X 10.12, 10.11, 10.10, 10.9. If your computer is running macOS 10.13 and later, you can resort to the next manual way.

Step 1. Launch EaseUS CleanGenius and click on Uninstall under Tool;

Step 2. Find and select applications or programs that you want to remove and click on Uninstall;
Selected application, software or program will be removed in seconds.

How to Force Delete an App on Mac Using Terminal

Warning: This will result in the permanent deletion of an app with no undo option. If you need the app again, you have to reinstall macOS. If not necessary, this is not recommended. If you must do, perform a backup in advance and proceed at your own risk.

1. Launch the Terminal, located in /Applications/Utilities/

2. Type the command: cd /Applications/. This will change to the Applications directory. Then, you can start deleting apps.

3. Type the following commands to delete different apps.

How To Empty Trash Mac

To delete Safari, type sudo rm -rf Safari.app/

To delete Mail, type sudo rm -rf Mail.app/

To delete FaceTime, type sudo rm -rf FaceTime.app/

Can't Drag App To Trash Mac

To delete QuickTime Player, type sudo rm -rf QuickTime Player.app/

Similarly, you can enter different software names to delete the corresponding programs.