Find and open apps with the Dock and Spotlight

An app is a program: Notes, Safari, Mail, Claude. Your Mac comes with dozens. There are three ways to open one.

The Dock

The Dock is the row of icons at the bottom of the screen. Click an icon once to open that app. A small dot under an icon means the app is already open. The first icon, a blue and white smiling face, is the Finder. It is always open.

If the Dock is not at the bottom, it may be on the left or right edge. If it is hidden, move the pointer to the bottom edge of the screen and wait. It slides up.

Spotlight: the fastest way

Spotlight is a search box that finds apps, files and more.

1. Hold Command and press Space. A search box appears in the middle of the screen. You can also click the magnifying glass at the top-right of the menu bar.
2. Type the first letters of the app's name, for example saf for Safari.
3. The best match shows at the top. Press Return to open it.

Spotlight also searches your files, the web and your email, so the top result can be something else. Read the top line before you press Return. If it is not the app, press the down-arrow key to move down the list.

The Applications folder

Every app lives in a folder named Applications. To see it: click an empty part of the Desktop, then hold Shift and Command and press A. A Finder window opens showing every app. Double-click one to open it.

On older versions of macOS there is also Launchpad, a rocket icon in the Dock that shows all apps as a grid. On the newest macOS, Spotlight shows this grid instead.

Keep an app in the Dock

When an app is open, its icon appears in the Dock to the right of the fixed icons. To keep it there after you quit:

1. Control-click the icon in the Dock (hold Control and click).
2. Point at Options.
3. Click Keep in Dock.

Later you will keep the Claude app there, because you will open it every day. To remove an icon, drag it up out of the Dock until the word Remove appears, then let go.

Practice

1. Press Command + Space, type calc, press Return. The Calculator opens.
2. Quit it with Command + Q.
3. Open it again from Spotlight, and keep it in the Dock using the steps above. Then remove it again.