The 50 best keyboard shortcuts for Mac

keyboard shortcut, firework
Apple.com and Flickr/foxypar4

Keyboard shortcuts make you a lean, mean productivity-machine by allowing you to keep your fingers stationed on the keyboard, as opposed to moving back and forth to the mouse.

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In fact, Brainscape crunched the numbers: If the average computer user wastes two seconds per minute switching off between these two computer accessories, they could save eight work days per year by swapping in all available keyboard shortcuts. Greater productivity means more time you could be spending on a beach, right?

To help you achieve digital-nirvana, we rounded up the 50 best keyboard shortcuts for the Mac.

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LEARN THE BASICS

baby sloth
Flickr/qmnonic

Select all, copy, cut, or paste content in a jiffy.

select copy cut paste, keyboard shortcut
Melia Robinson/Tech Insider

⌘+a selects all. ⌘+c copies. ⌘+x cuts. ⌘+v pastes.

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Undo and redo actions.

redo undo, keyboard shortcuts
Melia Robinson/Tech Insider

⌘+z undoes. ⌘+y redoes (in some cases ⌘+shift+z redoes).

Find a keyword.

find keyword, keyboard shortcut
Melia Robinson/Tech Insider
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Open a new window, open a new tab, or close a tab in applications like Finder or a web browser.

new tab close, keyboard shortcut
Melia Robinson/Tech Insider

⌘+n opens a new window. ⌘+t opens a new tab. ⌘+w closes a window.

Quit the program in use.

quit app, keyboard shortcut
Melia Robinson/Tech Insider
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Reopen the last tab you closed (up to 10 tabs).

reopen last closed tab, keyboard shortcut
Skye Gould and Melia Robinson/Tech Insider

Duplicate an item. It's faster than copying and pasting.

duplicate, keyboard shortcut
Melia Robinson/Tech Insider
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Rename a file. (You have to select it first.)

rename, keyboard shortcut
Melia Robinson/Tech Insider

Use Spotlight to search for things like apps, documents, images, and other files.

spotlight search, keyboard shortcut
Melia Robinson/Tech Insider
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Bold, italicize, or underline text.

boldface italicize underline, keyboard shortcut
Melia Robinson/Tech Insider

⌘+b bolds text. ⌘+i italicizes text. ⌘+underlines text.

Take a screenshot of the entire screen.

screenshot fullscreen, keyboard shortcut
Melia Robinson/Tech Insider
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Take a screenshot of part of your screen. (Your pointer will change into a crosshair.)

screenshot window, keyboard shortcut
Melia Robinson/Tech Insider

Use the right-click function.

right click, keyboard shortcut
Melia Robinson/Tech Insider
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Highlight the URL search bar in your web browser.

highlight url bar, keyboard shortcut
Melia Robinson/Tech Insider
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Cycle through tabs in apps like Finder or a web browser.

cycle through tabs, keyboard shortcut
Melia Robinson/Tech Insider

⌘+left arrow changes view to the left adjacent tab. ⌘+right moves to the right.

Jump down a web page.

page down, keyboard shortcut
Melia Robinson/Tech Insider
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And leap right back up a page.

page up, keyboard shortcut
Melia Robinson/Tech Insider

Shoot all the way to the bottom or top of a web page.

page bottom top, keyboard shortcut
Melia Robinson/Tech Insider

⌘+up arrow scrolls to the top of the web page. ⌘+down arrow jumps to the bottom.

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Toggle between programs. You can cycle through all open apps by holding ⌘ and pressing tab or arrow keys.

cycle through apps, keyboard shortcut
Melia Robinson/Tech Insider

BE A SOCIAL BUTTERFLY

sorority baseball selfies
MLB
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Compose a new tweet or direct message on Twitter.

twitter tweet message
Melia Robinson/Tech Insider

View home page, notifications, messages, or profile on Twitter.

twitter navigation, keyboard shortcut
Melia Robinson/Tech Insider
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View a list of all available keyboard shortcuts on Twitter.

twitter view shortcuts, keyboard shortcuts
Melia Robinson/Tech Insider

Post a new status on Facebook.

facebook post status, keyboard shortcut
Melia Robinson/Tech Insider
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View home page, profile timeline, and messages on Facebook.

facebook navigation, keyboard shortcut
Melia Robinson/Tech Insider

LEVEL UP

"Super Mario Bros."
Nintendo
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If an app is unresponsive, you can force it to close using Force Quit.

force quit, keyboard shortcut
Melia Robinson/Tech Insider

Permanently empty the trash. (Careful, there are no take-backs on this one.)

empty trash, keyboard shortcut
Melia Robinson/Tech Insider
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Put your computer to sleep.

sleep, keyboard shortcut
Melia Robinson/Tech Insider

Learn information about a selected file in Finder, including file size, date of creation, and dimensions (if it's a photo).

view information in finder, keyboard shortcut
Melia Robinson/Tech Insider
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Hide the windows of the current app in use.

hide windows, keyboard shortcut
Melia Robinson/Tech Insider

Paste formatted content as plain text.

paste as plain text, keyboard shortcut
Melia Robinson/Tech Insider
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Reveal the desktop.

reveal desktop, keyboard shortcut
Melia Robinson/Tech Insider

Define any highlighted word.

define highlighted word, keyboard shortcut
Melia Robinson/Tech Insider
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Select the text between the cursor and the beginning (or end) of the current line.

highlight line of text, keyboard shortcut
Melia Robinson/Tech Insider

Select the text between the cursor and the beginning (or end) of the current word.

highlight word, keyboard shortcut
Melia Robinson/Tech Insider
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Select the character to the left (or right) of the cursor.

highlight character, keyboard shortcut
Melia Robinson/Tech Insider

Toggle between open windows in applications like Finder or a web browser.

toggle between windows, keyboard shortcut
Melia Robinson/Tech Insider
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Did we leave off your favorite?

Let our resident keyboard-shortcut-enthusiast @meliarobin know on Twitter by using the hashtag #keyboardshortcutoftheweek. We might share yours with our readers!

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