How to see all your open windows on a Mac

macOS gives you two ways to see your windows as pictures and two to see them as a list of names, plus one setting that tidies Mission Control. Apple describes them the same way on macOS 14 Sonoma through macOS 27, except where a note below says otherwise.

Mission Control

Apple's Mission Control guide describes it as showing all of the windows open on your desktop, arranged in a single layer so none overlap. Your other desktops, and any apps in full screen or Split View, sit as thumbnails in the Spaces bar along the top. Click a window to bring it forward, or a thumbnail to go to that desktop.

Open it with ⌃↑ or the Mission Control key; every other way in, from gestures to hot corners, is in how to use Mission Control. To see another desktop's windows, go to it (⌃→ or ⌃←, or click its thumbnail) and open Mission Control again. With two displays, Mission Control on the second one shows only that display's windows and spaces.

App Exposé

Press ⌃↓ to spread out all the open windows of the app you're using; Apple's list of Mac keyboard shortcuts calls it showing all windows of the front app. Windows you minimized appear too, smaller, along the bottom of the screen. For any app, not just the front one, Control-click its Dock icon and choose Show All Windows (See all your open windows, Apple's guide for macOS 15 and 26).

While it's open, press Tab to browse the windows of your other apps, one app at a time (What's it called on my Mac?). More in App Exposé on a Mac.

Group windows by application

When Mission Control is a jumble of a dozen windows, this setting sorts it. Apple's Desktop & Dock guide says it has the windows organized by app in Mission Control.

1. Open Desktop & Dock settings

   Choose Apple menu › System Settings, then click Desktop & Dock in the sidebar. You may need to scroll down.

2. Turn it on

   In the Mission Control section, turn on Group windows by application.

3. Open Mission Control

   Press ⌃↑. Each app's windows are now gathered together.

It changes only the layout: Mission Control still shows the desktop you're on.

The Dock's window list

Control-click (or right-click) an app's icon in the Dock, and its menu lists the app's open windows by name: the quickest way to count one app's windows without switching to it. Using that menu to switch is covered in every way to switch windows.

The Dock also holds the windows you minimized: each gets a spot of its own at the end of the Dock, near the Trash, or goes into its app's icon if Minimize windows into application icon is on in Desktop & Dock settings. To get there from the keyboard, press ⌃F3 (or Fn⌃F3) to move focus to the Dock, then use the arrow keys and Return.

The Window menu

Most apps list their open windows at the bottom of the Window menu, and choosing one brings it to the front. Apple's guidelines for the menu bar ask apps to list them there. A checkmark marks the active window and a diamond (◆) marks a minimized one, so it's also the place to count an app's windows.

• Bring All to Front, in the same menu, brings all of the app's windows forward and keeps their positions; hold ⌥ and it becomes Arrange in Front, which tiles them neatly.
• From the keyboard: press ⌃F2 (or Fn⌃F2) to move focus to the menu bar, press → to Window, then Return. Type the start of a window's name to jump to it.

What they leave out

Each tool shows a slice. Here's what's missing from each:

• Other desktops. Mission Control shows only the desktop you're on; the rest, and full-screen apps, are thumbnails you visit one at a time.
• Other displays. Opened on a second display, Mission Control shows that display only.
• Minimized windows. Mission Control leaves them out. They're in the Dock, in App Exposé's bottom row, and marked ◆ in the Window menu.
• Hidden apps. An app you hid with ⌘H keeps its windows out of Mission Control until you switch back to it. Show All, in the menu named after the app you're in, brings every hidden app back.
• Other apps. App Exposé, the Dock's menu, the Window menu and ⌘` each cover one app, and ⌘Tab lists apps, not windows.
• Names. Only the Window menu lets you type to reach a window, and only by the start of its name, one app at a time. None of them searches every window's title at once.

So the full check is Mission Control on each desktop and each display, plus a look in the Dock. That's fine with a few windows open; with many apps across several desktops, it's slow. For every way to switch once you've found the window, see how to switch between windows on a Mac, and if a window doesn't turn up anywhere, find a lost window goes through where it might be.

With Flick

Flick, the window switcher we make, is the one list macOS doesn't have. Hold ⌥ and tap Tab, and every window gets a row with its app's icon, name and window title: windows on every desktop and display, in full screen, minimized, and in apps you've hidden. A small icon at the end of a row says when a window is minimized, full screen, in a hidden app or on another desktop. Type a few letters to narrow the list, then let go: Flick takes you to the window's desktop, or restores it from the Dock, and brings it forward.

It's a list, not a picture. Flick shows no previews, so Mission Control is still the better way to find a window by what's in it, and the two share no keys. The free version switches between your 5 most recent windows; a license lists every window.

See how Flick lists every window