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Because I haven’t done a Mac tips article in a while, and I know quite a few of you like to ask what’s on my Mac, I thought the release of macOS Tahoe was as good a chance as any to write one. Tahoe comes with a new design language in the form of Liquid Glass and some fairly expansive overhauls in other areas like Spotlight.
That being said, preparing a Mac for optimal use still hasn’t changed much. In this article, I’ll show you how I set my Mac up and what I do to keep it running smoothly and to my tastes through ten different aspects. These are the things I do to every new Mac I own, and they work on older versions of macOS too, so don’t worry if you haven’t jumped on Tahoe yet.
1. Brutalise Your Dock
Yes, I said brutalise.
The dock, by default, is a disaster zone. It’s cluttered with Apple’s own apps, GarageBand, Pages, Numbers, Stocks, all very clever but utterly useless for most of us. My advice? Strip it down to the essentials. And by essentials, I mean the apps you use every single day.
Get rid of everything else. No mercy. If you launch it less than weekly, it doesn’t deserve dock space.
Then shrink the dock. Yes, you can resize it:
- Head to System Settings > Dock & Menu Bar
- Pull the size slider down until it feels right.
For me, that means small enough to be discreet but large enough to see what I’m clicking. Combined with Spotlight (hit ⌘ + Space to search and launch anything), it’s a productivity win.
2. Use “Minimise Windows into Application Icon”
Tidy people rejoice: this is a game-changer.
macOS, by default, dumps every minimised window into the right-hand side of the dock. If you have ten Safari windows open, you get ten tiny preview boxes sitting in your dock like squatters refusing to move.
Related: My definitive Mac buying guide!
Fix this by going to System Settings > Desktop & Dock, and turning on “Minimise windows into application icon.” Now, minimised windows collapse neatly into their respective app icons. Your dock stays pristine, and you can still access them with a right-click.
It’s one of those small tweaks that makes everything feel more elegant.
3. Enable Snap to Grid on Desktop
Ah, the classic Mac desktop, a dumping ground for screenshots, downloads, and forgotten dreams.
If you’ve ever looked at someone’s Mac and seen a horrifying sprawl of icons just dumped across the screen at random, you’ll know what I mean. Thankfully, there’s a solution.
Right-click on your desktop, click “Show View Options”, and enable “Snap to Grid.” This forces icons to line up neatly, so you don’t end up with files overlapping like a badly played game of Tetris.
Bonus tip: keep your desktop empty. It’s not a filing cabinet. Use the Downloads folder (more on that later).
4. Finder Tweaks That Make a Difference
Finder is your main navigation tool, so you might as well make it work for you.
First, enable “Show Hard Disks on Desktop” in Finder settings. This puts your Macintosh HD (or whatever you’ve renamed it) right on the desktop. It’s a little bit of a hangover from my Windows days, but it’s just…nice.
Help: MacBook Pro Buying Guide
Second, go to View > Show Status Bar. That little strip at the bottom of Finder tells you how many items are in a folder and how much space you have left. It’s brilliant. No more hunting through settings to see how full your drive is.
Lastly, switch to list view. You can fight me on this, but list view is better if you like knowing what’s going on at a glance.
5. Trackpad Settings
This one’s for MacBook and Magic Trackpad users.
Head into System Settings > Trackpad and make sure “Tap to click” and “Secondary click” are enabled. The former saves you pressing down hard to click. The latter lets you use two fingers to right-click, an absolute must if you’re coming from Windows.
These two changes alone make the Mac trackpad feel miles more intuitive. Once you get used to it, it’s far quicker too.
The best ever Mac? Read my M4 Mac mini review
6. My Essential Mac Apps
This isn’t necessarily a single tip, but I have a set of apps that I always download on every Mac I use. Everyone has their own workflow, but if you haven’t yet, give these a try as they have genuinely helped me get my act together!
- Outlook: Hands down the best email and calendar combo I’ve used. I used to use Apple’s native calendar and also dabble with Google, but Outlook just has the best organisation, file management and scheduling crossover I’ve seen yet. Happy to be given a better option but this is my favourite right now.
- Notion: Practically every piece of information relevant to content produced on the YouTube channel or website is contained in Notion so if I need to find something, I know where to go. The great thing about Notion is that you can make it as simple or complex as you like to suit your needs. There’s automation functionality too if you so desire to use it, although that goes over my head somewhat. There are other options, like Trello for example, but I like Notion for how (incoming productivity buzzword) minimalist it is and the level of customisability.
- Slack: I’m sure you know what Slack is, but if you don’t, it’s a digital workspace platform where your team can easily message each other either as part of channels or via DMs. I think most people agree now that it is the best workspace out there and it’s hard to disagree. You can video call within the Slack app, too via the ‘Huddles’ option which is honestly so much easier than scheduling a whole Google Meet invitation.
- TickTick: TickTick is like a to-do list but on steroids. In fact, it may be one of the most feature-packed apps I’ve ever used, considering the premise upon which it exists. You can create different lists for whatever you want, so that your personal and professional lives don’t get mixed up. I like having a separate one for exercise goals, and each to-do item can be given its own deadline with a reminder. You can attach files to to-dos as well and filter them based on dates or priority.
- TextExpander: This is one is a game-changer. If you type repetitive messages, emails or content every day, TextExpander allows you to set up a shortcut with just a single word. For example, if you have a staple price quote email, you can make it so that when you type ‘pricing’ the entire email gets written for you. It saves so much time, trust me.
- RoboForm: You don’t appreciate how good a password manager is until you use one. If you have a load of different logins and don’t want them all stored on Google or Apple’s autofill, then keeping them locked away in one place makes so much sense. Roboform is brilliant but 1Password is also great.
- Final Cut Pro/Lightroom/Logic Pro: For content creation, obviously. You can’t really compromise on these things, and there are industry standards that everyone uses for good reason. If you want to get into content creation, you’ll need to learn the ropes with these apps at some point.
- Ulysses: Ulysses is the best writing app I’ve ever used. I moved away from it for a time, but am back now and realised how much I missed it. It offers a very plain experience, focusing entirely on writing with a variety of tools to help out in logical areas. You can organise documents in a load of different ways, and tag their statuses, there’s a built-in editing assistant, grammar/punctuation checker and the ability to convert documents into PDFs, Word documents, eBooks and more. There’s even functionality for posting straight to WordPress and Medium.
You might not need all of these, but having a few good tools makes a world of difference.
7. Add Web Apps to the Dock
You can turn websites into apps now. Sort of.
Open Safari, go to a site you use often (Notion, BBC Sounds, Gmail, whatever), click the Share icon, and select “Add to Dock.” That site will now launch in its own window, free of browser clutter. It even gets its own icon.
I use this for Notion and BBC Sounds. They behave just like real apps. It’s one of the best features Apple has added in years, and hardly anyone talks about it.
8. Clean Up the Menu Bar
The top right corner of your screen, also known as the Menu Bar, can quickly become a chaotic mess of icons. Most of them are things you didn’t even ask for.
Hold ⌘ (Command) and drag icons off the menu bar to remove them. Or drag things onto the menu bar from Control Centre if you use them often (like Focus Modes or Screen Recording).
A tidy menu bar = a tidy mind.
9. Get a Proper Webcam
This might seem unrelated to macOS Tahoe, but bear with me.
If you’re using a Mac Mini or an external display with your MacBook, chances are the webcam situation is…suboptimal. Either there isn’t one, or it’s the potato-cam built into the Studio Display.
I’ve switched to the OBSBOT Meet 2. It’s tiny, plugs straight in, and makes me look a lot more professional on calls. It has AI auto-framing, surprisingly good microphones, and autofocus that doesn’t make you look like you’re phasing in and out of existence. The difference it makes to video calls is night and day.
10. Use the Downloads Folder as Your Junk Drawer
This one’s definitely a personal preference, but I must say, I think it’s genius.
Everything I need temporarily goes into the Downloads folder. PDFs, random files, stuff I only need once, it all gets dumped in there. Then, every couple of weeks, I blitz it. This is to stop myself from making the home page a cluttered mess, and I much prefer it this way.
Doing it like this might unsettle some of you, but whatever you do, stop using your Desktop as your dumping ground!
Bonus Tip: Embrace the Scratches
Look, your Mac is going to get scratched. It’ll pick up dings, scuffs, and little cosmetic imperfections. Let it. After a couple of months, you won’t care. These things are tools. Beautiful ones, yes. But they’re designed to be used, not wrapped in bubble wrap.
Got your own macOS Tahoe tips? Drop them in the comments or ping me on socials, I’d love to know how you set up your Mac. I hope this helped, let me know the tip you’d most likely use!
