Use accessibility features on Mac

Accessibility comes standard with a Mac. Whether you have difficulties with vision, hearing, or physical mobility, macOS includes a variety of features to help you work in alternative ways—and make your Mac even easier to use.

Use the built-in screen reader called VoiceOver

VoiceOver is the built-in screen reader on your Mac that describes aloud what appears on the screen and speaks the text in documents, webpages, and windows. Using VoiceOver, you control your Mac with the keyboard or trackpad gestures, or connect a refreshable braille display to use with VoiceOver. To customize VoiceOver, use VoiceOver Utility. See the VoiceOver User Guide.

Make content on the screen larger

  • You can use your mouse or use your trackpad to zoom and make the entire screen larger or just an area of it. If you’re using a second display with your Mac, you can choose which display to zoom—or zoom both.

  • You can use Hover Text to zoom whatever is under the pointer—text, fields, menu items, buttons, and more—in high resolution in a separate window.

Reduce motion on the screen

If motion on the screen of your Mac is problematic, you can set an option to reduce motion when using certain features, such as Spaces, Notification Center, or the Dock.

Use a physical keyboard or an onscreen keyboard

You can set options to turn on Sticky Keys and Slow Keys so it’s easier to press keys on a physical keyboard. Or you can bypass a physical keyboard altogether and use the onscreen Accessibility Keyboard instead.

Control the pointer and mouse actions using alternate methods

Use Voice Control and text to speech

Change how your keyboard, mouse, and trackpad work

You can set various options to customize how your keyboard, mouse, and trackpad work while using your Mac. For example, you can adjust the speed at which the pointer moves across the screen when you move your finger across the trackpad. To set these options, choose Apple menu > System Preferences, then click Keyboard, Mouse, or Trackpad.

Control your Mac with assistive devices

  • With Switch Control, you can use one or more adaptive accessories to enter text, interact with items on the screen, and control your Mac. Switch Control scans a panel or the user interface until a switch is used to select an item or perform an action. See Use Switch Control.

  • When you use the Accessibility Keyboard, you can use Dwell with a tracking device to control the pointer so it’s easier to enter text, interact with items on the screen, and control your Mac. With Dwell, you can dwell for a specified amount of time on a control to perform a mouse action. See Control the pointer using Dwell.

You can quickly enable or disable some accessibility features using the Accessibility Shortcuts panel.

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