Overriding Keyboard Shortcuts

Here’s a quick quality-of-life tip that has made my workflow much smoother: you can override any application’s keyboard shortcuts directly within macOS.

While some apps, like Xcode, allow you to customise shortcuts internally, many others don’t provide this flexibility.

Thankfully, macOS offers a built-in way to remap shortcuts for almost any app.

Xcode remap key bindings
Xcode remap key bindings

How to Update Keyboard Shortcuts

Follow these steps to customise keyboard shortcuts for any application on your Mac:

  1. Open System Settings.
  1. Navigate to Keyboard in the left sidebar.
  1. Click on the Keyboard Shortcuts... button.
  1. In the popup window, select App Shortcuts from the left sidebar.
  1. Click the + button to add a new shortcut.
  1. Choose the application you want to modify.
Tip

You can target All Applications to apply the same shortcut override globally. For instance, you can override the Save As... shortcut across all apps like Safari, Microsoft Word, and VSCode.

  1. Enter the exact Menu Title of the command you want to change.
Important

The menu title needs to match exactly. Watch out for subtle differences like an ellipsis … versus three full stops ....

  1. Enter your new keyboard shortcut and click Add.
New keyboard window
New keyboard window

My Personal Shortcut Overrides

Here are a few of my favourite custom shortcuts. These have been real game-changers for me, especially since I tend to be a bit clumsy with keyboard inputs.

Original Menu TitleOriginal ShortcutOverridden ShortcutReason
Quit Safari⌘Q⌘⇧WI often closed the entire browser when trying to close a tab with ⌘W.
Add to Reading List⌘⇧D⌘SI rarely need to save a webpage source, but saving to Reading List is something I use often.
Export as PDF...No existing shortcut⌘⇧PAssigning a shortcut for a menu item that didn’t have one previously.

With these simple changes, I’ve significantly improved my productivity and minimised accidental app closures or misplaced shortcuts.

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