How to Access Mac’s Hidden Files – Guide

If you delete or move any files in your PC’s backend catalogs, libraries, or files, something could go wrong. That’s why we don’t suggest you mess with them unless you realize what you’re doing. Windows users can track these files in File Explorer, where confirming changes and errors is simple. To prevent Mac users from doing the same, Apple hides a large number of these files. ..

Hidden files and folders on a Mac can be accessed through Finder or the Terminal app. However, there is not much motivation to play around with these documents, like migrating program indexes or troubleshooting drivers – and assuming you hope to clean up some hard drive space, there are alternative approaches to achieving this. ..

How to Access hidden Mac files

Showing hidden files via Mac Finder

To view hidden files on a Mac, open the “Finder” application and click on the “Go” button in the toolbar. In the “Go” window that appears, select the “Files” tab and then click on the “Hidden Files” button. This will display a list of all of the hidden files on your computer. ..

Open the Finder.

Press the command key and the shift key at the same time to create a new line in the text editor.

The hidden files will be displayed as translucent paste in the main window.

If you want to obscure the files again, use the same Command + Shift + . (period) combination.

Mac Terminal: show hidden files

To view hidden files on a Mac, you can use the “Terminal” application. This method is more advanced, and requires some familiarity with the Mac operating system. ..

If you want to open Terminal, type “Terminal” into the Mac search bar. Alternatively, you can find it by clicking Go in the menu bar, selecting Applications, scrolling down to Utilities, expanding the folder, and clicking Terminal.

If you want Finder to show all files in the current directory, type “com.apple.Finder AppleShowAllFiles” and press Enter.

killall Finder and press the Enter key again.

  1. In the Finder, select the “Go” menu and choose “File > Save As…”
  2. In the Save As dialog box, type in a name for the file and click “Save”
  3. In the Finder, select the “Go” menu and choose “Folder > Show All Files”
  4. Locate and open the hidden files you just saved. ..

Type com.apple.Finder and press Enter to set the Finder to show all files.

killall Finder and press the Enter key again.

  1. Open Terminal.
  2. Type “cmd” and hit return.
  3. Type “sh” and hit return.
  4. Type “pwd” and hit return.
  5. Type “~/.config/autostart” and hit return.
  6. Type “sudo autostartctl hide” and hit return.

Hide files by dragging them into the Terminal window.

Press Enter to hide the files.

Remember to hide your Mac files using NordLocker’s Mac file encryption. This way, only you will be able to see the contents of the files.

Viewing Hidden Files on a Mac Using File Managers

To reveal hidden files on a Mac, use a third-party file manager like ForkLift. This process is relatively easy, and here’s how to do it with ForkLift: ..

Open the ForkLift app and start working on your project.

In the View menu, click the arrow next to the Location field. On the Location tab, under Current Location, click Change. In the Change Location dialog box, type your new location in the New Location field. Click OK. ..

Show hidden files.

Final note

Accessing Mac’s Hidden Files: A Step-by-Step Guide ..