How to manage windows on Mac

leonid.shutov@hey.com (Leonid Shutov) — Thu, 26 Mar 2026 14:40:12 -0400

Why you need a window manager

If you already know the answer, feel free to jump straight to the setup guide.

If not, I’ll try to convince you that the built-in ways of navigating windows on macOS are… not great. Unless you only ever use 1–2 apps—in that case, honestly, you probably don’t need this article.

Let’s look at what macOS gives you out of the box.

Command (⌘) + Tab

The classic. The OG.

Command (⌘) + Tab

This how everyone switches between apps.

And it works… until you have more than a handful of them open.

At that point, you’re just tapping Tab over and over like you’re spinning a roulette wheel hoping to land on the right app. The more apps you have, the worse it gets. Technically speaking, it’s O(n)—practically speaking, it’s annoying.

Also, it only works at the app level. Got 5 Chrome windows? Command (⌘) + Tab will only get you to the most recent window.

P.S. Command (⌘) + Shift + Tab just spins the wheel the other way. Still a wheel.

Cycling windows within an app

You can press

Command (⌘) + ` (backtick)

to cycle through windows of the current app.

This is a nice complement to Command (⌘) + Tab, but it has the exact same flaw: it doesn’t scale. More windows = more key presses.

So instead of solving the problem, it just moves it one level deeper.

App Exposé

App Exposé shows all windows for the current app.

You can trigger it with

Control (⌃) + ↓

or a three-finger swipe down.

Visually, this one is actually pretty nice. You see everything at once. No guessing.

But now you have to use your mouse (or trackpad) to pick a window.

And once you go back to the mouse, your workflow slows down immediately. It’s just how it is.

Mission Control

Mission Control (F3) or

Control (⌃) + ↑

or a three-finger swipe up shows everything: all apps, all windows, all desktops.

Looks powerful. Feels powerful.

But then you try to actually use it.

Two problems show up pretty quickly:

Windows move around, so you can’t build muscle memory. You’re always scanning the screen like “where did Tim Cook put my window this time?”
You still need the mouse to pick anything.

So yeah, it’s great for seeing everything, not so great for quickly switching.

Multiple desktops (Spaces)

Multiple desktops (Spaces) sound like a power feature.

By default,

Control (⌃) + ← / →

or a four-finger swipe.

Which means—you guessed it—more cycling.

The more desktops you have, the more steps it takes to get where you want.

What you really want is direct shortcuts like “jump to desktop 5”.

macOS almost gets there.

You can assign shortcuts for Desktop 1 and Desktop 2.

That’s it.

Desktop 3? 4? 10? Nope.

Fun fact: older macOS versions actually allowed more:

(Found on apple.stackexchange.com)

Why reduce it from 4 to 2? No idea.

Stage Manager

And finally, Stage Manager.

Apple’s latest attempt at improving window management.

It puts your windows on the side, groups them nicely.

But once you actually try to use it, you realize it’s mostly a mouse-driven feature again.

Which means it doesn’t really solve the main problem: speed.

Summary

At this point, a pattern should be pretty obvious:

Too much cycling
Too much guessing
Too much mouse

That’s exactly what a proper window manager fixes.

How to set up a window manager

At this point, we know what we don’t want.

So let’s define what we do want:

Apps open automatically when your Mac starts
Instant switching between them
Performance that doesn’t degrade as you open more windows
Predictable layout (so you build muscle memory)
Zero mouse required

Choosing a window manager

If you’re coming from Linux, you’ve probably seen tools like i3, dwm, or Hyprland.

macOS doesn’t have that level of ecosystem, but there are still a few solid options:

Aerospace
Yabai
Amethyst

I went with Aerospace.

Why?

Because it does everything I need without requiring you to disable SIP (System Integrity Protection). If you’re on a work laptop, that alone makes the decision for you.

What we are trying to achieve

Here’s the setup we’re aiming for:

When you start your Mac → your apps open automatically
Each app goes to its own workspace
Each workspace has a label (like 1, 2, B, etc.)
You jump between them instantly with Option(⌥) + label

So for example:

Browser is on workspace B
You press Option(⌥) + B
You’re there instantly

No cycling. No guessing. No mouse.

Installation

The easiest way to install Aerospace is via Homebrew:

brew install --cask nikitabobko/tap/aerospace

First launch

After installing, you’ll find Aerospace in your Applications folder.

Open it like any other app.

The only permission it needs is Accessibility access. This is how it controls and arranges windows.

Go to Settings → grant the permission → launch Aerospace again.

Once it’s running, you’ll see a new icon in the menu bar.

On first launch, it’ll most likely show 1. That means you’re on workspace 1.

Basic moves

Let’s actually use it.

Go to workspace 1

Option(⌥) + 1

Move the current app to workspace 2:

Option(⌥) + Shift + 2

Switch to workspace 2:

Option(⌥) + 2

Go back and forth:

Option(⌥) + 1
Option(⌥) + 2

You can also use letters:

Move app → Option(⌥) + Shift + B
Jump → Option(⌥) + B

Configuration

The default configuration provided by Aerospace covers all we need for our basic setup. The only 2 things we want to add are:

Opening predefined applications on startup
Assigning these applications to their own workspaces

Step 1: copy the default config

We need to re-create the default config to make changes on top of it. The easiest way to do it is by executing this command:

cp /Applications/AeroSpace.app/Contents/Resources/default-config.toml ~/.aerospace.toml

Now open ~/.aerospace.toml in your favorite text editor.

Step 2: start Aerospace on login

Make sure that this is set to true. We want aerospace to be the first application to be launched.

# Start AeroSpace at login
start-at-login = true

Step 3: launch apps on startup

Define which applications should be opened once aerospace is launched. Update after-startup-command.

Example:

after-startup-command = [
    'exec-and-forget open -a "iTerm"',
    'exec-and-forget open -a "Microsoft Edge"',
]

Now iTerm and Edge open as soon as aerospace is ready.

You can use aerospace list-apps to see the names of applications which are currently opened.

Step 4: assign applications to workspaces

Add these rules to the config:

[[on-window-detected]]
    if.app-id = 'com.googlecode.iterm2'
    run = 'move-node-to-workspace 1'

[[on-window-detected]]
    if.app-id = 'com.microsoft.edgemac'
    run = 'move-node-to-workspace B'

Here Application ID is mapped to workspace label. This means that as soon as these applications open they immediately get assigned to their workspaces.

Again, aerospace list-apps is very useful to see Application IDs of currently opened applications.

My full config for reference: https://github.com/leonid-shutov/.dotfiles/blob/mac/env/.config/aerospace/aerospace.toml

Final step

Log out and log back in.