How to Use Fast User Switching on Mac

  • 20 April 2022
  • 5 replies
  • 21 views

Userlevel 7

 

Do you have multiple user accounts on your Mac? Perhaps you have separate accounts for personal and for professional use, or a Guest account for others to use? In that case, you may be interested in taking advantage of a nifty hidden feature called Fast User Switching.

 

As the name suggests, Fast User Switching it allows you to switch between Mac user accounts considerably faster. This is also great for family Macs, where multiple user accounts use the same machine. Typically, in order to switch to a different user account on your Mac, you have to manually sign out and log back in from the Apple menu. With Fast User Switching, it feels like you’re toggling between different accounts. The feature combines the logout and login actions using a single click.

 

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5 replies

Userlevel 7
Badge +8

Wow OK. I suppose we get a little used to the features Microsoft has had since forever. I didnt even know this was a thing.

Userlevel 7
Badge +6

I use a Mac at work mostly for testing purposes and this feature is a God-send. So annoying to have go through the whole login-logout process each time.

Userlevel 7
Badge +4

Is this a new feature or was it just not widely known? Does it extend to tablets or are user accounts not a thing on iPads?

Userlevel 7
Badge +4

Is this a new feature or was it just not widely known? Does it extend to tablets or are user accounts not a thing on iPads?

Has been around for a long while on Macs, just not something you would know unless directly told.

I worked for years as an Apple technical trainer so was lucky enough to be exposed to a lot of shortcuts and tricks that most people never know are there.


And this needs multiple login users to work so can only be done on a macOS device, not on iPads, iPhones etc as you dont login to a user account on those.

Userlevel 7
Badge +4

Didn’t know about this. Handy for home use as we share a Mac.

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