Tip of the Day: 4 ways to Force-quit a frozen Mac app

Freezes, crashes, hangs… they happen, even with the best Mac apps. Here are four ways you can force-quit an app that’s not responding:

1. Click the Apple menu and choose Force Quit (or press Command-Option-Escape), select the offending app, and click Force Quit.
2. Option-right-click (or Control-Option-click) the frozen app’s Dock icon and choose Force Quit.
3. To force-quit the frontmost app immediately, press Command-Shift-Option-Escape.
4. Open Activity Monitor, select the process in the list, click the X button on the toolbar, and click Force Quit.

If one method doesn’t work, try it a second time, and if that doesn’t work, try another. If nothing works, restart your Mac. Remember that you may lose unsaved changes when force-quitting an app.