Add or change a keyboard shortcut for any menu item on a Mac

27 October 2026 · 7 min read

You can give any command in a Mac app’s menu bar a keyboard shortcut, or change the one it already has, in System Settings. Choose Keyboard, click Keyboard Shortcuts, then App Shortcuts. Click the Add button, pick the app (or All Applications), type the menu command exactly as the menu shows it, press the keys you want, and click Done.

It takes a minute, and it works in most apps. The two things that trip people up are typing the command’s name exactly, ellipsis included, and picking keys the app does not already use. Both are covered below.

The steps in System Settings

Choose Apple menu > System Settings, then click Keyboard in the sidebar.
Click Keyboard Shortcuts.
Choose App Shortcuts in the list on the left.
Click the Add button (+) under the list of shortcuts.
Open the Application menu and choose the app. If it is not listed, choose Other… and pick it from your Applications folder. Choose All Applications to set the shortcut for every app that has a command with that name.
In the Menu title field, type the command exactly as it appears in the app’s menu.
Click in the Keyboard shortcut field and press the keys you want to use.
Click Done.

Now open the app’s menu and look. Your keys should be printed beside the command, in place of the old shortcut if it had one. If the menu has not changed, quit the app with Command-Q (⌘Q) and open it again.

As an example, Preview gives no shortcut to File > Export as PDF… or Tools > Adjust Size…, so if you save PDFs or resize screenshots often, either one is a good first candidate.

Type the menu title exactly, ellipsis included

System Settings says it plainly: enter the exact name of the menu command. Apple’s guide adds that it must match the command as it appears in the app, punctuation included, so capitals, spaces and symbols all count.

The ellipsis is the usual snag. Commands that open a window or ask a question end in “…”. Apple’s guide says to type an ellipsis as three periods with no spaces, but Apple’s own menus use the single ellipsis character: Preview’s Adjust Size… and Export as PDF… both do. If a title typed with three periods does nothing, remove the entry and add it again with the single character. Type it with Option-Semicolon (⌥;) on the US and British layouts, or find it in the Character Viewer (Control-Command-Space) if your layout puts it elsewhere.

A few other things to watch:

Titles that change. Some commands swap their name with the state of the window, such as Show Sidebar and Hide Sidebar, or Enter Full Screen and Exit Full Screen. A shortcut belongs to one title, so add an entry for each title with the same keys.
Ampersands and other symbols. Type them as they appear. “Emoji & Symbols” is not “Emoji and Symbols”.
Commands in submenus. Type the path from the menu bar down, with -> between each name. Apple’s own example is TextEdit’s Format->Font->Ligatures->Use Default. A path also tells macOS which command you mean when the same title appears in two menus.
Your Mac’s language. If your Mac runs in another language, the menus are in that language, and the title you type must be too.

One app or All Applications

A shortcut for one app only affects that app. This is the safe choice, because you can check that app’s menus for clashes before you pick the keys.

All Applications applies your keys to every app with a menu command of that exact name. It is useful for commands many apps share under the same title, but it reaches apps you have not checked, including ones where your keys already do something else. Use it for keys you know almost nothing uses, and test it in the apps you use most.

Change or remove a shortcut you added

Every shortcut you add is listed under App Shortcuts, grouped by app. From there:

To change the keys, double-click the key combination and press the new keys. System Settings itself gives this instruction.
To remove one, select it and click the Remove button (the minus sign). Once you reopen the app, the menu goes back to the app’s own shortcut, or none.
To change a shortcut an app already has, add an entry for that command, as above. Your keys replace the app’s in its menu.

The other categories in the same list (Screenshots, Mission Control, Spotlight, Input Sources and the rest) hold the shortcuts macOS itself uses. They work the same way: double-click a shortcut to change it, or turn off its checkbox to stop using it. Modifier Keys, in the same list, changes what keys like Caps Lock and Control do.

Picking keys that will not clash

System Settings can flag clashes among the shortcuts in its own list, but it cannot see the shortcuts an app sets in its own menus. If you pick keys that another command already uses, Apple’s guide is plain about the result: your new shortcut won’t work until you change one of the two.

So check before you choose:

Open each of the app’s menus and read the shortcuts down the right-hand side. It is slow, but it is free and always accurate.
Favor three modifiers. Command with a letter is taken in almost every app, and Shift-Command with a letter often is too. Control-Option-Command with a letter is rarely used by apps.
Keep the keys near the job. If a command is about exporting, a letter like E is easier to remember than one picked at random.

A faster check is to see the whole keyboard at once. In Typebar, hold Command for a moment and the on-screen keys relabel with what they do in the app in front, read from that app’s own menus. The Cheatsheet List puts the same shortcuts in a searchable list and can show which keys an app leaves free. Which keys does an app leave free? walks through choosing them, and if you have a Hyper key, Hyper key shortcuts suggests what to put on it.

Because Typebar takes shortcut names from the app’s menus, and your new keys are printed in those menus, its keystroke pill names them as you press them, the same way it names the app’s own shortcuts.

When it does not work

App Shortcuts can only reach commands in an app’s menu bar. If yours does not take effect, the cause is usually one of these:

The command is not in the menu bar. Buttons in a toolbar, items in a sidebar and commands that only appear when you right-click cannot get a shortcut this way.
The app draws its own menus. A few apps, often games and some cross-platform apps, do not use the standard Mac menus, so there is nothing for macOS to attach the keys to.
The app has its own shortcut editor. Code editors, Final Cut Pro and many pro apps keep their shortcuts in their own settings, and those are the place to change them. In current versions of Final Cut Pro, Final Cut Pro > Command Sets > Customize opens the Command Editor (Option-Command-K). For editors, see Learn your editor’s keybindings.
The title does not match. Check the ellipsis first, then capitals and spaces.
The app was open when you added it. Quit and reopen it.

Questions

Can I change a shortcut that an app already has?

Yes. Add an entry under App Shortcuts with that command’s exact title and your new keys. Your keys replace the app’s, and removing the entry later brings the original back.

Why does my new shortcut not appear in the menu?

Usually because the title does not match exactly. Check the ellipsis first (three periods or the single … character), then capitals and spaces. Otherwise, quit and reopen the app.

Does it work in every app?

In apps that use the standard Mac menu bar, which is most of them. It cannot reach commands outside the menu bar, and apps with their own shortcut settings are better changed there.

Can I see what my keys do in an app before I pick them?

Open the app’s menus and read down the right-hand side, or hold a modifier in Typebar to see every key’s job in the app in front at once. Typebar is $9 once, with a 24-hour free trial.