How To Find And Show Hidden Files On Mac
Whether you’reorganizing files and foldersor just need to free up space on your hard drive, there will likely come a point when you’ll want to dig into some of the deeper areas of your Mac. The thing is, not all of the data installed on your system is visible by default.
In some cases, these files and folders may have been manually hidden — either by you or a previous or shared user — but there are also several items Apple has set to hidden out of the box (or upon installation). Regardless of the reasoning, you won’t be able to touch these hidden items to move or delete them until you’re able to actually find them in the first place.
Making the invisible visible (at least when it comes to files and folders in macOS) is a fairly simple process, but not one that’s immediately obvious from the outset. And while it’s possible to search for and reveal hidden items directly through the Finder, it’s not something your Mac will allow by default. So you need to know how to go about it before you go looking for metaphorical ghosts in your machine.
Revealing those hidden files and folders
While there’s one very simple and easy way to toggle visibility on and off for hidden files and folders, you do have a couple of other options if you’d prefer. You can do it inside Finder itself:
Or you can do it via the Terminal app:
Be aware that most of the hidden files in macOS aren’t made visible by default to prevent accidental deletion of anything vital to the system. So unless everyone who uses your Mac knows what to look out for, it might be best to set everything back to being hidden once you’ve finished what you initially set out to do.
Locating hidden items
While most of your Mac’s hidden files and folders are located in its hidden Library folder (not the regular one you can access through Finder), you may still need to search for them elsewhere.
Searching for invisible items will give you a better chance of finding hidden files and folders, but you’ll need to know the right search terms to make use of it.
