
First, if you want any applications with unsaved data to ask you to save changes when you run the finished Quit app, make sure that box is checked.

Once the Quit All Applications action is in place, you can customize it as desired.

Drag and drop this action into the blank space on the right of the Automator window. In the list of actions on the left, locate the one labeled Quit All Applications (you can use the search box to quickly locate this or any other action or variable). We’ve covered Automator before, but the basic layout is that variables and actions are listed on the left, and you can drag these items into a specific workflow order on the right, creating a virtually endless number of custom actions, workflows, and applications.įor our purposes, however, creating a custom app to quit all open applications in OS X is simple: it’s just a single action.
Mac close all apps at once how to#
Here’s how to quit all OS X apps at once with a simple little workflow.įirst, launch Automator from your Mac’s Applications folder and create a new Application. You can always close these apps one-by-one, but you can also harness the power of Automator to create a one-click solution that will handle this task for you. But modern Macs can handle a lot of running applications at once, and you may be overwhelmed by the sheer number of apps OS X has running in the background.

Here's a One-Click Solution That Lets You Quit All Open Mac OS X Apps at OnceĮvery Mac user has occasionally encountered a situation where they want or need to close all of the open apps on their Mac, be it for troubleshooting, to free up system resources, or in preparation for shutting the system off at the end of the day.
