How do I get the macOS app switcher back?

Switch Flick back to ⌥Tab

This keeps Flick running and gives macOS its keys back.

1. Open Flick's Settings

   Click Flick's icon in the menu bar and choose Settings. No icon? Open Flick again from your Applications folder, and Settings opens.

2. Go to Shortcuts

   Click Shortcuts in the sidebar. Under Default Mode, select Option ⌥ + Tab.

3. Use ⌥Tab for Flick

   The change is immediate. ⌘Tab, ⇧⌘Tab and ⌘` belong to macOS again, and you open Flick by holding ⌥ and tapping Tab.

You can make the same choice in the welcome window: choose Show Onboarding in Flick's menu bar menu and go to the hotkey step. Turning off Enable switcher shortcut also hands ⌘Tab back, but then Flick opens only with its search shortcut, ⇧⌘Space. Choosing between ⌥Tab and ⌘Tab compares the two modes.

Once you're back in Option mode, the keys work like this:

Quit Flick

Click Flick's icon in the menu bar and choose Quit, or press ⌘Q while the menu is open. The macOS app switcher is back the moment Flick quits. If you've hidden the icon, open Flick from your Applications folder; when Settings opens, choose Flick › Quit Flick.

If Launch at login is on in Settings › General, Flick starts again the next time you log in and takes ⌘Tab again. To keep Flick but not on ⌘Tab, switch it to ⌥Tab before you quit, or turn off launch at login.

If Flick quits unexpectedly

Flick hands ⌘Tab, ⇧⌘Tab and ⌘` back however it stops: a normal quit, a crash, or a force quit from Activity Monitor.

• A crash. Flick turns the macOS switcher back on as it goes down.
• A force quit. A force quit stops an app before it can do anything. For that case, Flick keeps a small helper running while it has ⌘Tab: a second copy of Flick's own program that waits for Flick to go away and then turns the macOS switcher back on.
• Both stopped at once. The next time Flick opens, it first turns back on anything an earlier Flick left off, then applies your choice.

Flick only ever turns back on what it turned off itself. If another window switcher turned the macOS switcher off, Flick leaves that alone.

Two Flick processes in Activity Monitor

That's expected while Flick is using ⌘Tab. The second process is the helper described above, called Flick because it's a copy of the same program. It only waits, and it goes away when you quit Flick or switch it to ⌥Tab.

⌘Tab still doesn't work

If you've quit Flick or switched it to ⌥Tab and the macOS app switcher still doesn't appear, check these in order:

• A copy of Flick is still running. Search for Flick in Activity Monitor. Once you've quit, nothing called Flick should be listed. A second copy of Flick, such as one opened straight from the disk image, keeps ⌘Tab until it quits too.
• Another app turned the switcher off. Some window switchers take over ⌘Tab themselves. Flick never turns on a switcher another app turned off, so check that app's settings, or quit it.
• Flick and its helper were stopped together. Open Flick, then quit it. When it starts, it turns back on anything an earlier Flick left off.
• Still nothing. Log out and back in. macOS keeps the switcher turned off only for your current login session, so a new session starts with ⌘Tab working.

If ⌘Tab stopped working and Flick was never set to Command mode, the cause is somewhere else: see why ⌘Tab stops working on a Mac.

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