Step-by-step

Move downloads and screenshots

1 Choose a location

Where do you want Safari to store downloaded files and macos to save screenshots? Open a Finder window and select icloud. We will use icloud root.

2 Create the folders

Ctrl+click an empty space or use Finder’s File menu and select ‘New Folder’. We need two: one called Screenshots and one called Downloads. Create them where you want.

3 Open Safari Preferences

Open Safari, click the Safari menu and select Preferences. Select the General tab, click ‘Downloads’ next to File download location; then select ‘Other’ to change location.

4 Move to icloud

We can now select a different location to store downloaded files, so select icloud in the sidebar and then select the Downloads folder you created earlier, like this.

5 Check it works

Close Safari Preferences and go to a website with downloads, like gutenberg.org. Download a file and open a Finder window to check the file is saved to the new Downloads.

6 Open Terminal

Downloads are done and now we want to set the location screenshots are saved to. Open the Utilities folder and then run Terminal. We must set the location with a command.

7 Use defaults

The defaults command in a Terminal window is used to change system settings not available elsewhere. Type: ‘defaults write com. apple. screencapture location’.

8 Add the path

Instead of typing the location, drag and drop from Finder. Make sure there is a space after the Terminal command then drag the Screenshots folder to the Terminal window.

9 Check it works

Press Enter and when the command prompt returns, press Shift+cmd+3 to save a screenshot. Open a Finder window and check that the image is saved to the icloud folder.