Folders on your computer can be difficult to navigate when they contain a lot of files. This is especially true of folders that get a lot of use, such as your Documents or Downloads folder.
One way to alleviate some of this confusion is by creating new folders and organizing your files into those folders. Our tutorial below will show you a couple of different ways to create new folders on your MacBook.
How to Make a New Folder on a Mac
The steps in this article were performed on a MacBook Air in MacOS High Sierra. Once you complete the steps in this guide you will have created a new folder, with a folder name of your choosing, in an existing location on your Mac. We are going to create the folder on the desktop for the sake of simplicity, but you can open Finder and navigate to a location where you would like to create a new folder instead.
Step 1: Navigate to the location on your computer where you want to create the new folder.
Step 2: Hold down the control key on your keyboard, click in empty space inside the folder, then choose the New folder option. Alternatively you can click the File tab at the top of the screen and select the New Folder option there. If you don’t see a New Folder option, then you may be inside a listing of files, such as “Recents,” rather than an actual file directory. You will need to navigate to an actual file directory to create a new folder inside of it.
Step 3: Type a name for the folder into the blue-highlighted field, then press Enter on your keyboard when you’re done.
You can also create a new folder in the current active directory with the keyboard shortcut of Shift + Command + N.
You can rename a folder later by clicking the folder once to select it, then clicking it again to edit the folder name. Note that clicking too quickly will be interpreted as a double-click, which will open the folder instead.
Have you been using the same password to log into your MacBook for a while, and you want to change it? Find out how to update a password on a Mac and change the password that you use to sign into your user account.
Kermit Matthews is a freelance writer based in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania with more than a decade of experience writing technology guides. He has a Bachelor’s and Master’s degree in Computer Science and has spent much of his professional career in IT management.
He specializes in writing content about iPhones, Android devices, Microsoft Office, and many other popular applications and devices.