How to Right Click Using Keyboard on Mac
Jul. 7, 2018Macs come with a ton of great keyboard shortcuts and bindings that make it really easy to perform a lot of tasks in the system. However, if there is one major keyboard shortcut that’s missing from macOS all these years, it’s that you can’t perform a right-click on a selected item using the keyboard. This particular feature has been present on Windows keyboards since time immemorial and it sucks that MacBooks don’t have it. So, if you’re looking for a way to perform a right-click from a Mac keyboard, we’ve got you covered.
Right Click Using Keyboard on Mac
For the most part, thereareways that you can configure keyboard shortcuts to perform a right click in macOS, however these ways simply perform a right click wherever the mouse cursor happens to be, instead of the file, folder, URL, or word that you happen to have selected. So after quite some time of scouring the internet, I was able to figure out three separate ways that you can right click on a highlighted element without having to move your mouse cursor there first.
The first (and the only free) method to right click on Mac using a keyboard requires some Apple Script work, and a little bit of playtime with Automator — both incredibly useful tools that Apple bundles with every Mac. Here are the steps you’ll need to follow:
tell application “System Events” to set frontApp to name of first process whose frontmost is truetell application “System Events"tell application process frontAppset _selection to value of attribute “AXFocusedUIElement"tell _selection to perform action “AXShowMenu"end tellend tell
Once you’ve done all this, you’ll be able to select any file or folder in Finder, and simply press the keyboard shortcut to open the right-click menu for that file or folder.
If you’re annoyed of having to add every single app you want to use the right click shortcut on to the list of apps allowed to control your Mac, you can use Better Touch Tool (45 day free trial; license starts at $6.50) as well. The app is paid, but it offers a free trial, and brings a lot of features. Here’s how you can use Better Touch Tool to right click on a selected element on Mac.
tell application “System Events” to set frontApp to name of first process whose frontmost is truetell application “System Events"tell application process frontAppset _selection to value of attribute “AXFocusedUIElement"tell _selection to perform action “AXShowMenu"end tellend tell
That’s it, you can now use your chosen keyboard combination to perform a right-click on your Mac.
If you don’t want to handle writing and saving an Apple Script, you can use a pre-built Alfred workflow. Alfred (free trial; license starts at £19) is a productivity app for Mac, and the only paid Mac app other than BTT that I recommend people to check out. There’s a free version available, but you’ll have to buy the Alfred Powerpack to use Workflows.
That’s it, you’ll now be able to use the hotkey to right click on any selected element on your Mac.
SEE ALSO:10 Best New macOS Mojave Features You Should Know
Using a Mac with just the keyboard is very much possible, and in many cases it’s easier to not use the trackpad (no matter how good) or a mouse to navigate your Mac. Personally, I’m more of a keyboard-leaning person myself and this shortcut is really helpful for me. So, now that you know how to right click on Mac with keyboard, go ahead and start using your Mac like a keyboard pro. If you face any problems, or if you know of another method to do this, let me know in the comments section below.
