How To Do Control F On Mac

What do the F1 and F keys do on Mac keyboards?

If you're sat in front of your Mac now, take a look downward at your keyboard. Sure, it has all of the characters y'all'd look from a keyboard, but there are some keys along the elevation of the keyboard that might not exist familiar to you. These are called role keys and all have Fx written on them, where x x is replaced with a number, like F1, F2, F3, F4, F5, F6, F7, F8, F9, F10, F11, F12. So what do the the F keys on a Mac do?

Glancing at the F keys on a Mac keyboard, you lot'll see an icon if you lot await to a higher place the function key number, and that icon shows whatelse the key can do. And with 12 keys to choose from, they can do quite a bit. Additionally, standard function keys can exist used within different apps in different ways, so be sure to check the keyboard shortcut options for your favorite apps to see if there are any that you lot should be making use of.

Below is a list of the functions bachelor for all of the Mac part keys. They should all exist present and correct if you're using an Apple keyboard on almost any modern Mac, except for whatever Mac with a Touch Bar anyway which uses a fiddling screen instead of the F keys. Of course some much older Macs may have different functions assigned to the F keys too, so we're assuming you lot're on mod hardware.

What the F Keys Do on Mac Keyboards

These are the primary defaults of what part keys practice on an Apple keyboard when connected to a Mac:

F1 – Decrease display brightness
F2 – Increment display brightness
F3 – Open Mission Control
F4 – Open Launchpad
F5 – Decrease keyboard effulgence (On compatible notebooks merely)
F6 – Increase keyboard brightness (On compatible notebooks simply)
F7 – Skip dorsum (Audio)
F8 – Intermission / Play (Audio)
F9 – Skip frontward (Audio)
F10 – Mute
F11 – Volume downward
F12 – Volume Up

Pressing a function primal volition invoke its secondary role by default.

To utilise the Fx keys as standard role keys, press and hold the Fn button and then press the required office key.

If you're using a non-Apple keyboard that doesn't have an Fn cardinal, try pressing and holding the Control key instead.

Changing Role Primal Beliefs on Mac

Yous tin modify the default behavior of the part keys on Mac too, nonetheless. This basically inverts their function abroad from defaulting to things like brightness and audio controls to standard F keys.

Open up System Preferences from the  Apple menu
Click "Keyboard" from system preferences
Select "Use F1, F2, etc. keys as standard part keys" to make the change.

Click "Use F1, F2, etc. keys as standard function keys"

If you make this modify, yous'll need to printing downwards the "FN" key on the keyboard and so printing the F1, F2, F3, etc keys to perform the action that is on the keys icon (for example, irresolute brightness, or muting system volume). Some users on older Macs in particular prefer this, as we covered previously some time ago.

Similarly, if you're using a MacBook Pro with a Touch Bar, printing and hold the Fn key to see the F1 through F12 keys and and then tap the screen to use them.

Where is the FN primal on a Mac keyboard?

The FN fundamental is in the lower left corner on mod Mac keyboards with a U.s. layout. Information technology is labeled with 'fn' and a world icon on the newest Macs, or merely 'fn' on slightly older machines.

Mac FN key location

The FN key is necessary to access the alternating function row fundamental options, depending on how your Mac keyboard is configured. The fn key is also sometimes used in keyboard shortcuts.

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If the Mac has a Touch Bar simply yous'd like to always see the function keys, you can really disable the Impact Bar on MacBook Pro so that the Impact Bar remains the same all of the time, you can set information technology to either show an F primal row or the actions row, whatsoever yous prefer.

If you're new to the Mac you may not know about some of the other cool tricks y'all tin do with the Fn key, like move "Abode" and "Cease."

If your keyboard isn't working properly y'all can besides enable a software-based virtual keyboard, also, simply oft cleaning the Mac keyboard can improve key printing problems.

This obviously is aimed at Mac keyboards either from Apple or third parties, but if you lot're using a third party PC keyboard and you take a unlike ready of F keys (or even none at all), you tin can consult your keyboard's manufacturer for more information about the role row.

There are a ton of other keyboard shortcuts, like navigating text amidst many others that are well worth learning if you spend a lot of fourth dimension typing on a Mac too. They'll completely modify your game once you master the ones that yous use virtually.

Do you employ the function keys often? Take you changed the behavior of any of the F keys for any other purpose? Let u.s. know your experiences and thoughts in the comments.