Quick Look

Edit and annotate files without needing to open them in compatible apps

In Mojave, macos has taken on new abilities with the Quick Look feature letting you make changes to specific files without needing to open up compatible apps that would otherwise be required to edit them. With just a tap of the spacebar a new panel will appear which will indicate if changes can be made this way and if so you will see a selection of tools at the top for you to play with. This feature is sure to be one that’s well used in the future once you are familiar with how it works.

1 Almost any file

With a file displayed in Finder or even if just selected in a list view, you can hit the spacebar and a new panel will appear in an instant. No menus to select.

2 Are there tools?

If you can make changes to the file without a compatible app you will see tools at the top that you can use. Take some time to see what each tool does.

3 Annotate images

Annotating images is easy in Quick Look with a variety of tools to play with and to make additions with before you share them with others through one click.

4 Managing PDFS

PDF files can be annotated using similar tools to the ones available for images. You can also quickly add saved signatures without opening any other app.

5 Trimming media files

You can also trim video and audio files using Quick Look which is one of the biggest time savers of all. The changes made will be saved instantly.

6 It’s not universal

Many file types will need a compatible app to work, of which text-based files will make up the majority. Press the spacebar to check for Quick Look functionality.