Flick and Mission Control, side by side

The short answer

Mission Control shows you your windows. Press ⌃↑ or swipe up with three fingers, and the windows open on your desktop spread out in a single layer, with your other Spaces and full-screen apps as thumbnails in the Spaces bar along the top (Apple's Mission Control guide). Flick lists them: every window on every Space and display gets a row with its app and title, and typing a few letters finds the one you mean.

Use Mission Control to see what's open or to rearrange it; of the two, it's the one with previews. Use Flick when you know which window you want and it could be anywhere. They don't share any keys, so you can use both. For ⌘Tab, ⌘` and the Dock as well, see Flick and the built-in switchers.

At a glance

When Mission Control fits better

• You recognize windows by how they look. Untitled documents, or several windows with near-identical titles, are easier to tell apart in a preview than by name. Flick has no previews: each row shows the app's icon, its name and the window's title.
• You're arranging, not just switching. In Mission Control you can drag a window onto another Space in the Spaces bar, drop it on a full-screen app's thumbnail to use the two in Split View, and add Spaces, up to 16 (Work in multiple spaces). Flick switches to windows; it doesn't move them.
• You're moving things between windows. Apple suggests it for copying: copy something, open Mission Control, click the window you want, and paste. ⌘ with the Mission Control key moves every window aside so you can drop a file on the desktop.
• You work from the trackpad or mouse. A three-finger swipe up opens it. Apple's guides for macOS 15 Sequoia and later also list a two-finger double-tap on a Magic Mouse, and dragging a window to the top of the screen.
• You want nothing to install. It comes with macOS and needs no permission. How to use Mission Control

When Flick fits better

• The window is on another Space. Mission Control shows other Spaces and full-screen apps as thumbnails in the Spaces bar, so a window there takes two steps: go to the Space, then find the window. Flick lists it by name, with an icon saying it's on another Desktop, and picking it takes you there. Windows on other Spaces and in full screen
• You have more windows than you can scan. Type a few letters of an app name, a window title or the file a window shows, and the best match is selected. With a license, search finds tabs in Safari, Google Chrome, Brave and Microsoft Edge too.
• You go back and forth. A quick tap of ⌥Tab returns to the window you were just in without showing the list. Hold ⌥ and keep tapping Tab to go further back, or press ⌥1 to ⌥9 to jump to a row.
• Minimized windows and hidden apps. They're in the same list as everything else. Picking one brings it back from the Dock, or shows its app first.
• You use more than one display. Flick's list covers every display at once, and opens on the display with the pointer or the one with the active window, as you choose. In Mission Control on a second display, Apple says only that display's windows and Spaces are shown.

App Exposé and the front app's windows

App Exposé is Mission Control for one app. Press ⌃↓ to see all the open windows of the app you're using, or swipe down with three or four fingers if App Exposé is turned on in Trackpad settings; press the keys again, or swipe up, to go back. To see all your open windows grouped by app, Apple's guide points to Group windows by application, in Desktop & Dock settings under Mission Control. More about App Exposé

Flick's version is the front app's windows. Press ⌘` if Flick uses ⌘Tab, or ⌥` once you turn it on with the ⌥Tab trigger, and Flick lists only that app's windows, most recent first, under a heading such as “Safari · 4 windows”. Windows on other Spaces, in full screen and minimized are included. Tap to flip back to the app's previous window, hold and tap ` to pick another, or type to search only that app's windows; with a license, a browser's own tabs are searched too. In the free version, the list shows the app's windows among your 5 most recent. The front app's windows

Use both

Flick doesn't change Mission Control. ⌃↑, ⌃↓ and the trackpad gestures stay as they are; Flick's own keys are ⌥Tab, or ⌘Tab if you choose it, and its search shortcut, ⇧⌘Space unless you change it. A workable split: Mission Control to look over a desktop or move windows between Spaces, Flick to jump to a window you can name.

If you miss seeing where a window is, Flick can outline it. In Settings › Appearance, set Show where the selected window is to Outline or Outline and dim. While the list is open, Flick draws a line around the selected window on screen, using only the window's position, never what it shows. A window that's minimized, hidden or on another Space has nothing on screen to outline.

Questions