To capture your screen on a Mac, you can use built-in keyboard shortcuts or the native Screenshot app.
Here is the quick guide to doing both:
1. How to Take a Screenshot
Entire Screen: Press
Command (⌘) + Shift + 3. A thumbnail will appear in the corner of your screen; clicking it allows you to edit it, or you can wait for it to save automatically to your desktop.Selected Portion: Press
Command (⌘) + Shift + 4. Your cursor will turn into a crosshair. Click and drag over the area you want to capture, then release the mouse button.Specific Window or Menu: Press
Command (⌘) + Shift + 4, then immediately press theSpacebar. Your cursor will turn into a camera icon. Click on the window or menu you want to capture.
2. How to Record Your Screen (Video)
To record a video of your screen, you can bring up the built-in screen capture menu:
Press
Command (⌘) + Shift + 5.A control bar will appear at the bottom of your screen.
Choose your recording option:
Record Entire Screen: Click the icon that looks like a full screen with a solid circle.
Record Selected Portion: Click the icon that looks like a dashed box with a solid circle, then drag the frame to adjust the recording area.
(Optional) Click Options in the control bar to select a microphone if you want to record audio, set a timer, or choose where to save the video.
Click Record.
To Stop recording, click the small Stop button (a circle with a square inside) in the menu bar at the top right of your Mac screen, or press
Command (⌘) + Control + Esc.
By default, both screenshots and screen recordings are automatically saved to your Desktop.
No, the built-in macOS screen recording tool (Command + Shift + 5) does not give you a direct option to select video quality (like choosing 1080p, 720p, or 4K) before you record.
Instead, it automatically records at your screen's native resolution. For example, if you have a Retina display, it will record a very high-quality, high-resolution video by default.
How to manage quality and file size:
If you want to change the quality or scale down the file size, you have a couple of options:
Change screen resolution before recording: You can go to System Settings > Displays and lower your Mac's resolution before you start recording. The tool will then record at that lower resolution.
Downscale after recording: Once the video is saved, you can open it in QuickTime Player, go to File > Export As, and choose a lower resolution like 1080p or 720p to reduce the file size.
Use a third-party app: If you need precise control over frame rates, bitrates, and exact resolutions while recording, you will need to use a dedicated app like OBS Studio or Capto.