Macs are very happy to stay on all the time. In fact, some people ask whether or not they should turn off their Mac every night, but sometimes you need to turn it off to clear memory, fix errors, save a machine. that’s under lock and key, or just put it away for a few weeks while you’re on vacation. There are several ways to turn off a Mac, depending on the situation. Here’s our quick guide on how to turn off a MacBook or Mac.
The most common way to turn off a Mac is to use the macOS menu. This allows the system to properly close open applications and manage all running processes, so the shutdown is as clean as possible. To do this, follow these simple steps.
- Click the Apple icon in the upper left corner.
- Select Close.
- At this point you will have one minute to stop the shutdown process, or you can click Close again to stop immediately.
- If you do not want open applications to reopen when you restart the machine, deselect the ‘option’Reopen windows when reconnecting‘ option.
- Confirm your choice by clicking Close Again.
- Your Mac will now begin the shutdown process, but you will be given the option to save any unsaved documents you may have open and you will be asked to confirm if any applications need to be closed.
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Tip: Apple recommends not closing a MacBook’s screen until the screen has gone completely black, as this may prevent it from shutting down properly and increase the time it takes to restart the machine.
How to turn off a Mac with the power button
If your Mac becomes unresponsive and you can’t access the shutdown menu to close it, you can press the power button to turn off your Mac. Here’s what you need to do:
- Press and hold the Power button until the screen goes blank.
- There is usually an audible sound to listen for, either a click or the sound of the fans stopping, which tells you it has turned off.
- Wait about a minute before restarting the Mac.
It’s not as clean a method as the software approach, and you may lose unsaved data or open documents at the time, but, most of the time, everything should be there when you reboot the device.
If you are unfortunate enough to have lost something you were working on, you may want to read our guide on how to recover a lost Word document.
How to close an unresponsive app
If your Mac has an app that has stuck and is causing problems, you may not need to completely shut down your Mac. The Force Quit command can allow you to reset the problematic application. Here’s what to do.
- Right-click the application icon in the Dock at the bottom of the screen.
- Select the Exit option.
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If that doesn’t work, there are several other ways to force quit:
- Press and hold the Option (or Alt) key while right-clicking the app in the Dock and you should see the Force Quit option.
- Click the Apple menu and select Force Quit.
- Press: Command + Option (or Alt) + Esc to open the Force Quit dialog box.
- Open the Activity Monitor app and select Force Quit.
Hopefully this will clear any system hangs that are causing slowdowns or other issues. If not, you may want to use the method above to restart your Mac.
There are other ways to close misbehaving apps, all of which are covered in our How to Force Quit on a Mac guide.
If you come from the PC world, you may be more familiar with control-alt-delete, but this key combination won’t work on a Mac.
As with the Force Quit command, there are different approaches to shutting down an unresponsive Mac, which we explain in our guides How to Fix a Frozen MacBook or Mac and What to Do If Your Mac Won’t Shut Down.
How to Program a Mac to Turn On and Off
These aren’t always issues that make people want to shut down their Mac. You may simply prefer your device to turn off at night or at other specific times. This was part of macOS and was found in the Energy Saver section of System Preferences. Unfortunately, Apple decided to remove this feature with macOS Ventura, and it is now only accessible through the Terminal app.
Granted, this isn’t something the vast majority of Mac users will want to bother with, as it requires a small amount of coding. If you’re determined, you can read our tutorial on how to schedule your Mac to shut down and restart, which walks you through all the required steps.
If, after all this, you discover that the problem is more serious than just a glitch, then you may want to consider upgrading to a newer machine. If you want to know which devices we recommend, check out our Mac buying guide where we take a look at all the current deals and highlight which ones will suit different people, depending on their needs.
