Hi, this is Gary with MacMost.com. Let me show you how you can choose
which application is used to open up a document and how to set the default for that file type.
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So often when we want to open up a document we simply find it in the Finder,
double click it, and it will open up in its default app. But how does it know which app
to use to open up the file and how can you choose another one? For instance, here I have four files.
This one here is an image. If I were to doubler click it it would automatically open up in the
Preview app. But what if I wanted it to open up in a different app. After all,
I have many apps on my Mac that can handle image files.
One way to open up a document in any app that can handle it is to simply
open up the app first. So for instance I'll open up Pixelmator Pro here. I can go to File,
Open and then choose the file I want to open. Here I am in my example Files folder. I could
now select that file, open and now I've opened it up in Pixelmator even
though it's not the default app and the one I get when I double click.
Another way to do it would be to drag and drop it to the application.
So let me open up a new Finder window. In that new window I'll go to the Application's folder. Here
I'll find a variety of different apps. Like, for instance there's Affinity Photo. I can simply drag
and drop this to Affinity Photo and it will launch Affinity Photo and open up the image in that app.
Now to make this easier you can add the app to the Dock. So I can take Affinity Photo here.
Drag it to the Dock. Add it in and now I can use that as the place to drag the file. So
I can drag this file down to the Dock. Drop onto Affinity Photo and it will open it up in that app.
But there are more ways to do it. For instance you can Control click on the file or two finger click
on a trackpad or right click on a mouse to bring up the Context Menu. Then you get an Open command.
Open works just like double clicking the file. You can also go to File and Open or Command
O to do that. But below Open is Open With. Then you'll get a list of all of these different apps,
starting with the default app at the top, but other apps that say they can handle this kind of
file. Now what each app does with the file may be different. For instance here I see three browsers,
Firefox, Chrome, and Safari. If I open up the image in those I'm just going to be able to view
the image. But if I opened it up in PhotoShop, Acorn, Pixelmator, or Affinity Photo then I'm
going to be able to edit and manipulate the image. So I can select Acorn here and it will open it up
in Acorn. This may be the quickest way to deal with it. After all, for something like an image
you may want to open it up with different apps in different situations all the time.
The default isn't as important because the situation you're in is going to determine which
app you want to use. So bringing up the Context Menu, using Open With, is the best way to do it.
But let's say I did want to change the default app for opening this kind of file. If I hold down the
Option key, with this menu open, notice Open With changes to Always Open With. Then I can select
an application, like Pixelmator, and now it opens that up in Pixelmator as before. The difference is
that if I look again at this file, under Open With, you can see Pixelmator is now the default.
If I just double click it it will actually launch Pixelmator and open it up. To switch back I would
simply bring up the Context Menu again, go to Open With, hold down the Option key and then
choose the app that I want to use as the default. So in this case Preview. Which still shows as
the default cause it is the System default for opening this kind of file. Now I've reset it.
So let's say I have this set to Always Open in Pixelmator Pro. Notice here I have a file with
the same extension. But if I double click that that opens in Preview. Changing the default for
a file only changes it for that one file. It doesn't change it for other files of the same
type. To change it for all files of the same type select one of those files. Go to File,
Get Info or use Command I. Then look for Open With and here you'll see a similar list that we
saw in the Context Menu. You have the default at the top and other apps here. You can then
select the one you want to use. Let's try Acorn here. Then that will change it for that one
file. But you also have a Change All button. Click that Change All button and you're prompted
to Confirm. Now when I look for this file I can see the default is Acorn. But also for
this file it is changed as well. Notice now the System default, with the little default
in parentheses there, is changed also. It's no longer Preview, although Preview is in the list.
So you can do similar things for other kinds of files. For instance here's a .mov file. If I
Control click on that I can see QuickTime Player is the default. But I have the third party VLC
player installed. When you install VLC it's kind of notorious for switching your System default
to VLC. Then to get back to QuickTime Player you would actually have to select a file by type,
use Command I, change the Open With to QuickTime Player and click Change All. Here I am in a
Microsoft Word file. Now I may not want these to be opened by Word by default. Or maybe I don't
even have Word installed. If I look here you can see I do have Word installed and it says it's the
default. But both Pages and TextEdit can open Word documents. You may want to decide which one
of those handles documents. If you get occasional Microsoft Word documents from colleagues at work
and you just need to read the text that is in there you might want to use the lightweight
TextEdit as the default. But if you need to work with those files and you don't have Microsoft Word
you might want to set it as Pages or perhaps you have something else, like Open Office or Libre
Office, installed on your Mac and you can set that as the default to handle those Word documents.
So a few other things. Notice if I go to the Context Menu and use Open With these are all
suggestions of apps that say they can handle this kind of file. But notice at the bottom it says
Other. Select that and then you're prompted to choose any application. It starts in the
Applications Folder but you can go anywhere on your hard drive now and select an application
and say, yes I do want to open this kind of file with this app. At the bottom here you
can enable Recommended Applications or All Applications and you could see now
All can be selected. Here you can also check Always Open With to set that file's default app.
If you don't see those there you have to click this Options button to reveal or hide those.
You have the same thing available when you have Command I. You have this list here
but at the bottom of the list you have Other and you can choose From Any App.