Mac Tips & Lessons
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macOS Classes5 Lessons
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New in macOS Sequoia3 Lessons
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Getting Started with the Mac13 Lessons
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14+ Tips for Getting Started with a New Mac (and older Macs)
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How to tell which macOS you are using
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Getting Around your Mac
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Working with Finder Windows
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Accessing Folders and Navigating Folders
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A Look a the Folder Hierarchy of the Mac
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Using Keyboard Shortcuts
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Notifications and the Notification Center
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Searching with Spotlight Search
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System Preferences Overview
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Mac Quick Look Demystified: Preview Files with Ease!
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Quickly access Mac system settings with Menu Bar or Dock
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Learn Cut, Copy, and Paste on Mac
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14+ Tips for Getting Started with a New Mac (and older Macs)
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Menu Bar Lessons for the Mac4 Lessons
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Dock Lessons for the Mac11 Lessons
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Automatically Hide the Dock
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Open Recent Documents from a Closed app with the Mac's Dock
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Open an App's Recent Documents through the Dock on the Mac
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Change the Position of the Dock
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Working with Applications in the Dock
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Documents and Folders in the Dock
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Customizing the Dock
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Add Printers to the Mac's Dock
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3 Easy Tips for Organizing your Folders in the Mac's Dock
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Unlock Hidden Settings for the Dock
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How to Add Folders to the Mac Dock
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Automatically Hide the Dock
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Finder Lessons for the Mac24 Lessons
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Opening an Enclosing Folder from a Finder Window
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Adding a Folder to the Sidebar in a Finder Window
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Cycle through your Open Finder Windows
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Set What Folder A New Finder Windows Shows
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Finder Window View Options
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View Unopened Documents with Quick Look
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Arranging Files and Folders
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Actions and Tasks
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Finder Windows as Tabs
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Customizing the Sidebar
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Customize the Finder Window Toolbar
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Show the Path Bar in a Finder Window
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Keep Folders on Top
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Show the Status Bar in Finder Windows
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Set what is searched in a Finder Window
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Hide your Hard Drives from the Desktop
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Add Documents to a Finder Window Toolbar
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Resizing Finder Window Columns
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Copy the location of a File or Folder as Pathname
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Set what your Finder Windows Open To
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Show the Mac's Clipboard in a Window
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Create a PDF from Multiple Images with Quick Actions on the Mac
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The ultimate guide to the Mac's Finder: 24+ tips included!
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Need help Organizing Your Mac? Master Smart Folders Today!
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Opening an Enclosing Folder from a Finder Window
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Manage Applications on the Mac24 Lessons
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Easily Open the Applications Folder
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Apps and Significant Energy
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Set which Applications Open at Login
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Add the Applications Folder to the Dock
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Close Windows when Quitting Apps
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5 Ways to Find and Open your Applications on the Mac
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Finding your Applications Folder
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Switching between Open Applications
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Hiding Open Applications
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Launchpad and Applications
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Opening Applications with Spotlight Search
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Installing Applications
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Removing or Uninstalling Applications
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Applications in Full-screen Mode
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Finding an App’s Preferences or Settings
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Open Apps with the Launchpad Icon
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Use Keyboard Shortcuts to Switch between Open Apps
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Shrink Apps to Prevent the MacBook Pro Notch from Obscuring App Controls
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Prevent In-App Rating & Review Notifications
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How to Check App Version History on Your Mac
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How to Use Multiple Desktops with Spaces
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Switch between open apps with the Mac's App Switcher
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Enhance your Mac experience by Installing iOS apps
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Add a Signature to a Document
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Easily Open the Applications Folder
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Manage Files and Folders on the Mac30 Lessons
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Selecting Documents and Folders
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Working with Save Dialog Boxes
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Deleting Files and Folders
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Copying, Moving, and Grouping Files
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Move Selected Files into a New Folder
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Specifying Applications for Documents
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4 Ways to Open a File on the Mac
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3 Ways to Force Quit an App on the Mac
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4 Ways to Edit Finder Window Sidebars on the Mac
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Create A New Folder with Selected Files on the Mac
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Using Spring-loaded Folders
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Compressing Files and Folders
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Convert and Compress Images with Quick Actions
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Viewing Document Information
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Renaming Files in Batches
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Tagging Files and Folders
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Set What App a Document Opens With
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Open Windows Media or WMV Files
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Tips for finding your Downloads Folder
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See Folder Sizes in a Finder Window
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Duplicate Documents with Stationery Pad on the Mac
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Reverse the Print Order of your Document
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Creating PDFs on a Mac: Two Easy Methods
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Save Time and Effort: How to Select Multiple Files on Your Mac
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How to Easily Zip and Unzip Files on Your Mac
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Learn how to use Find and Replace on the Mac
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Rename Multiple Files on the Mac
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How to Manage Storage on Your Mac - Easy Tips & Tricks!
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Ever Wondered How to Rename Mac Files? Top 7 Tips Here!
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11 Easy Ways to Optimize Your Mac's Desktop Experience
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Selecting Documents and Folders
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General macOS Lessons21 Lessons|1 Quiz
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Have your Mac Learn Spelling
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Close Notifications with a Swipe
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Working with the Today View
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Using Siri
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Using Mission Control
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Add Virtual Desktops with Spaces on the Mac
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Sharing Files with AirDrop
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iCloud Options
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Take a Screenshot of your Display
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Add Emojis as Text
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View All Open Windows as Thumbnails
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Copy, and Paste and Match Style
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Type Special Characters with the Keyboard Viewer
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Set where Screenshots are Saved
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Add a Timer to Screenshots
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Hide all your open windows to show the Mac's Desktop
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Turn on Do Not Disturb Temporarily
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Using Split View
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The Mac’s Magic Shortcut to Trashing Files and Photos Quickly
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10 Little Known Tips for the Mac
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Keyboard Navigation on the Mac
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Have your Mac Learn Spelling
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Preferences or Settings for the Mac34 Lessons
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Organize and Hide System Preference Panes
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General Preferences
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Working with Printers and Scanners
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Share Connected Printers with other Macs
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A Quick look at Sound Preferences
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A closer look at Internet Accounts
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Creating User Accounts
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Set an Animated Emoji for your Mac User Profile
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Customize the Date and Time in the Mac's Menu Bar
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Adding Parental Controls
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Change the Cursor Size
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Show the Date in the Menu bar
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Change the Clock in the Menu Bar from Digital to Analog
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Set the Scroll Bar to Always Show in a Window
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Create a New user Account
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Text Replacement
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Quickly Look up Information with the Trackpad
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Shortcuts for opening System Preference Panes
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Rename your Mac
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Searching your System Preferences
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Set the Default Browser on the Mac
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Reduce the Transparency in the Menu Bar and Dock
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Open Preference Panes from the Dock
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A closer look at Wi-fi Settings
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Using Hot Corners
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Select what macOS Updates you want to install
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Create Keyboard Shortcuts for Menu Items
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Use Keyboard Navigation to Move Focus
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Enable Fast User Switching to Switch between User Accounts
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Use Touch ID to Switch between Users on the Mac
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How to Zoom into your Mac's Display for Easier Reading
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How to Extend Your Mac Display to Your iPad
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Disabling Showing the Notification Center from the Trackpad
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Can Force Click Boost Your Productivity on your Mac? Find Out How!
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Organize and Hide System Preference Panes
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Troubleshooting Lessons for the Mac16 Lessons
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Finding Help for your Mac
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Backing Up with Time Machine
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Restoring Files with Time Machine
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Erase a Hard Drive
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Force Quit an App on the Mac
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Restart or Relaunch the Mac's Finder
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Force Quit Apps from the Apple Menu
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Putting it All Together
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Automatically delete items in the Trash after 30 Days
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Troubleshooting Bluetooth Connections
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Manage Storage Space with macOS Monterey and Earlier
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Reclaim Local Mac Storage Space by Removing iCloud Drive Downloads
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Disable Unused Sharing Options on Your Mac If You’re Not Using Them
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Forget Wi-Fi Networks that are Troublesome
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View memory usage in Activity Monitor on Mac
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Erase All Content and Settings on a Mac
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Finding Help for your Mac
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New in macOS Mojave12 Lessons
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Dark Mode Appearance
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Dynamic Desktop Pictures
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View Recent Apps in the Dock
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Gallery View for Files in Finder Windows
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macOS Software Updates in System Preferences
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Desktop Stacks for Files on the Desktop
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Keep Desktop Folders on Top of Files
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View File Metadata
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Quick Actions and Markup Files
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Continuity Camera from your iPhone or iPad
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New Privacy Options
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New Screenshot Options
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Dark Mode Appearance
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New in macOS Catalina19 Lessons
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See which apps will no longer work with macOS Catalina
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See which apps are 32-bit
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Opening Recent Folders from the Dock
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Reorganized System Preferences
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New Window Management Options
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New Screen Time Preferences
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New Music App
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New TV App
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New Podcasts App
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Manage your iOS Devices through the Finder
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What's New in the Photos App
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What's New in the Notes App
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What's New in Safari
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What's New in the Mail app
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New FindMy App
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New Catalyst Apps
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New Security and Privacy Features
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New Redesigned Reminders App
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Use an iPad as a second Display with Sidecar
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See which apps will no longer work with macOS Catalina
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New in macOS Big Sur15 Lessons
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What hasn't changed with macOS Big Sur
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Notification Center
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Allow Wallpaper Tinting in Windows
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Filtering Mail Messages
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New Control Center
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A look at the Finder Window Toolbar
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New with Desktop Pictures
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Play Startup Sound
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Drag and Drop Controls to the Menu Bar
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Battery Usage Preferences
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Change the Date & Time in the Menu Bar
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Do Not Disturb location in macOS Big Sur
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See what is Now Playing
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It’s Time to Consider Upgrading to macOS 11 Big Sur
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How to Reveal the Proxy Icon in Big Sur
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What hasn't changed with macOS Big Sur
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New & Updated in macOS Ventura12 Lessons
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How to Manage your Open Windows with Stage Manager
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New Setup Options and Filters in Focus on the Mac with macOS Ventura
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View Forecasts and More in the New Weather App on the Mac
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Add Multiple Stops to Routes in the Maps App with macOS Ventura
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Create Templates for Reminders Lists with macOS Ventura
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Maximizing Your Storage on macOS Ventura: A Guide to Managing Space
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Discover the New Clock App on MacOS Ventura
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How to Keep Scroll Bars Always Visible on Mac (macOS Ventura)
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Manage App Store and Streaming Services Subscriptions through the Mac
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Save time typing text and Emojis on your Mac with Text Replacement!
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3 Ways to Remove the Background in a Photo
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Stop Apps from Launching when your Mac Starts Up
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How to Manage your Open Windows with Stage Manager
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Favorite Features in macOS Sonoma9 Lessons
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Make Your Favorite Websites Act Like Apps with macOS Sonoma
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macOS Sonoma: Screensavers & Wallpapers
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Click your Wallpaper to Show the Desktop
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Add Widgets to your Mac's Desktop
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My 3 Favorite New Features in Reminders with macOS Sonoma!
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iCloud Passwords for Chrome: Seamless Access to Your Passwords
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Make your next Zoom Presentation stand out with Presenter Overlays
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Turn off Click Wallpaper to Show Desktop
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Build your own Apple Passwords app in 5 minutes! A Step-by-Step Guide
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Make Your Favorite Websites Act Like Apps with macOS Sonoma
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New in macOS Monterey6 Lessons
Convert and Compress Images with Quick Actions
Learn how to convert an image from one file type to another or compress an image with Quick Actions on the Mac.
Did you know you could convert images from one file type to another, or even compress an image using Quick Actions on the Mac? With Quick Actions, you can convert an image from a .png to a .jpg within a matte of seconds, all through the Mac’s Finders. See how easy it is to convert images with Quick Actions in this video for the Mac.
Video TranscriptionIn this video, we’re going to look at how we can convert images using quick actions on the Mac. With quick actions, we can easily select an image and convert it from one file type to another, such as a PNG to a JPEG, or even just compress a jpg to a smaller file. Let’s see how we do this. Let’s go to my Mac. So if we look at my Mac here, you’re going to see I have two images here I have this tulips dot png, as well as this lake dot jpg. So one is a PNG, the other one is a JPEG, I would like to convert this PNG into a JPEG, that’s what we’re going to look at first, how we can convert an image from one file type to another, I want to convert this into a JPEG, the first thing that I need to do is select it, we can see that I have it selected here. And now if I hold down the Ctrl key, and I click on it, we get a little contextual menu.
And one of the options here is quick action. If we go over to the right, you’re going to see we have a number of different quick actions, the one that we’re going to look at is our convert image. When I select this, I get a new window that pops up. And from here, I’m able to convert this image, I want to convert this into a JPEG. So if we go over to the left here, you’re gonna see I have format. jpg. So what this is going to do now is format this as a JPEG. What about the size? Well, what I can do is set how large I want it to be, the smaller the size, the more compression it is going to have, the worse it is going to look. So what I’m going to do is change this to large 240k is pretty good. So I’m going to leave it at large, this file is actually about eight megabytes. So this is going to compress it from an eight megabyte PNG file to a 240 kilobyte JPEG. So let’s go ahead and do that. I select this. And then we go over to convert an image that converts the image, and we can see we have my new converted image. So this one here, about eight megabytes, let’s go ahead and confirm that.
So I just select it, and then we go up under File, and you’re going to see, get info, this is going to open up a new window where I can view all the information for this file, we can see this is actually nine megabytes. So this new file here that I converted it to is going to be let’s go ahead and do that again. 240 kilobytes, so quite a bit smaller. Let’s see what the quality is on it. So now I just click on the first one, just single click on it, I’m going to use quick look at the spacebar gives me a quick look without actually opening it up. There’s my original file, this is the nine megabyte file. Now I’m going to go over to the other one, the new one, we can see we’re looking at my large file, we can see that there’s not a whole lot of difference here, I’m going to go to the original. And now I’m going to go to the compressed one.
So there is not a whole lot of difference there between those two files. But the file size is dramatically different. Let’s take a look at how we can compress a file of the same file type. In other words, I have this lake photo here, I want to make this smaller, this is about an eight or nine megabyte file as well. Let’s go ahead and check that out. So I have it selected, we go up under file. And then we go over to get info, we have our window that opens up. And we can see that this is eight megabytes. So what I want to do now is create a smaller version of this, maybe I’m going to put it on a website or send it to someone, I need to create a smaller version 8.6 megabytes is quite large, we can use that same shortcut, that same quick action shortcut. All I do is just select it, hold down the Ctrl key. And then we go over to quick actions and go over to convert image.
You’re going to see I can select my format. I’m going to leave it at jpg but I could convert this into a being or HEI F but I’m going to leave it at jpg I want it as a JPEG. I just want a smaller version of it. And then we set the size 47 kilobytes that’s going to be quite small. So I’m just going to go with large here, selected 757 kilobytes, still a little bit large. But if I’m sending this to someone, it’s not too bad. I can preserve the metadata. If it has location data, things like that. I can preserve that. So I’m just going to leave that in there. But if you did want to strip all that metadata out of there, you could And then all I have to do is just click on Convert to jpg. And we have my new file here. And this one here is about 750 kilobytes. Let’s take a look at the quality. We’re going to go to the original one here, press the spacebar for my quick look. There’s my original. And now we go over to the new one, we can see there’s a little bit more contrast with the new one.
But overall, it’s really not that much of a difference, and I am saving quite a bit of file space with it. I’m going to close this. If I needed to make it smaller, I could compress it again. Again, I just Ctrl click, we go over to quick actions convert image, let’s just go and make this one medium, maybe that was a little bit too large to earn and go with 197, you’re gonna see the difference here, I click on Convert. Now we have my smaller one, it’s medium sized. Let’s take a look at these three here. So like the first one spacebar quick look, there’s my original photo, there’s my large photo, so it’s compressed to about 10% of the original size. And then here’s my latest one you can see now it is getting smaller, physically smaller, and it is not nearly as sharp, original, large, medium. So as you go smaller with these photos will change the quality. So all you want to do is just find a good balance of one that looks good, while still retaining the quality. And you can easily do that just by going over to the original and converting it making multiple versions of it and see which one you like.
I like to have the second one here. So what I’m going to do is just go and throw this one away, so I just drag it down to the trash that’s a little bit too compressed for me. So that’s how you can use finder quick actions to convert an image from one file type to another, as well as how you can compress them even if it is the same file type. You just select the image, hold down the Ctrl key to get the contextual menu and then you’re going to see quick actions. From there you’re going to see convert image, select that select what you want to convert it to and your Mac will then convert that image. So that’s how you can convert images using quick actions on the Mac.