How to automatically quit apps on Mac

Your Mac, by default, leaves apps open even when you close the last window. Recent Windows converts find this confusing, but Mac users are used to it—the Mac has worked this way since the 1980s, before Windows as we know it even existed. 

Having said that, there are probably some apps you wish you could quit completely. Slack, and other team chat apps, for example, can get distracting if you leave them open all the time—it’s sometimes better to close them so you can focus on the task at hand. The same goes for things like email and text messages. I try to close these kinds of applications when it’s time to focus—but I don’t always remember.

Here are some tools I’ve found that do the job for me automatically—plus a walkthrough of how to quit Mac apps manually.

Automatically exit Mac apps with MagicQuit

MagicQuit is a free and open source app you can install on your Mac to quit applications after they’ve been open a certain number of hours.

Just install it, and you’ll find it in your menu bar. Click the icon, and you’ll see a list of all currently open applications with a checkbox and a countdown.

By default, the app will close all currently open applications if they’ve been running for 12 hours without any interaction. You can uncheck any app that you want to keep open, or you can open the Settings to change the number of hours before an app closes. 

I personally like to set this to one hour, but you can choose whatever amount of time you like. You can also set up MagicQuit to open when your computer starts up and even add a quit button beside every app in the list. 

Automatically exit Mac apps with Raycast

Don’t want to install a dedicated app just for quitting apps? Raycast, one of the best productivity apps for Mac, has this functionality built in. Raycast is an application launcher, but it does a lot more than just that. It’s more or less a Spotlight replacement—you can use it to quickly launch applications, find files, and interact with the web and your applications using plugins. 

I can’t possibly explain everything that Raycast does right now, but one of its functions is pretty similar to MagicQuit. Open Raycast, and search for Auto Quit. You’ll see a list of applications. 

You can search for any application and hit return to add it to the list of apps that will automatically quit. From now on, if Raycast is running, all of your selected applications will quit after a set amount of time. The default is three minutes, but you can change this by hitting command + return. It’s a nice little feature to have, especially if you’re using Raycast anyway. 

How to quit an app on Mac manually

You don’t need a third-party application to quit apps—the two above just help you automate quitting after a certain amount of time. You can still quit Mac apps manually: the simplest way to do it is with the keyboard shortcut command + Q while the application is open. Alternatively, you can use some clicks:

1. Right-click the Dock icon for the application

2. Click Quit.

The real power user tool, though, is somewhat hidden. 

1. Press command + tab, and keep holding the command key to open the app switcher.

2. Tap the tab key until you reach the icon of the app you want to close.

3. Press Q to close the currently selected application.

4. Repeat steps 2-3 for all the apps you want to close. 

This is perfect if you’re switching between projects and no longer need the same apps open. 

Related reading: