How to Kill an App on Mac (Every Way That Works)

To kill an app on Mac, press ⌘Q to quit it cleanly. If it has frozen, open the Force Quit window with ⌥⌘⎋ and select the app. For a stubborn process, end it in Activity Monitor or run killall AppName (or kill -9 PID) in Terminal. MEGAKILL kills any app in one click.

"Kill an app" is what most people coming from Windows or Linux type when an app on their Mac has locked up. macOS uses slightly different words for it, but the idea is the same: end the process so it stops eating memory and gets off your screen. There is a clean way, a fast way for frozen apps, and a Terminal way for the ones that refuse everything. Here is each one, with the exact keys and commands on current macOS (Sonoma and Sequoia).

What "kill an app" means on a Mac

The word "kill" comes from Unix, and macOS is built on Unix, so it applies more literally here than on most systems. In day-to-day use it maps to three different actions, and picking the right one saves you a lot of grief.

Quitting with ⌘Q is the polite version. The app gets a moment to save your work and shut down cleanly. Use this whenever the app still responds.

Force quitting is the hard stop for an app that has frozen. It ends the app right away without the save-and-close routine, so reach for it only when a normal quit gets ignored.

Killing from Terminal with killall or kill ends the process by name or process ID from the command line. It is the most direct route, handy for background processes that never show a window. If you want the full picture of the graphical options, our complete guide to force quitting on Mac walks through every menu in order.

Kill the front app the clean way with ⌘Q

If the app still responds at all, this is the right move. Click any of the app's windows to bring it to the front, then press ⌘Q. You can also use the menu bar: [App Name] → Quit. The app closes its windows, hands its memory back, and asks you to save first if there is unsaved work.

A lot of people think clicking the red dot in the corner of a window closes the app. It does not. That only shuts the window, and the app keeps running in the background with a small dot under its Dock icon. So when you mean to kill an app and not just hide it, ⌘Q is the key, not the red dot.

Force-kill a frozen app with ⌥⌘⎋

When an app shows the spinning beach ball and stops listening to ⌘Q, escalate to the Force Quit window.

1. Press ⌥⌘⎋ (Option-Command-Escape) from anywhere. A small window lists every running app.
2. Select the frozen one. If it is the culprit, macOS usually labels it "(not responding)" in red.
3. Click Force Quit and confirm.

This kills the app on the spot, so any unsaved work in it is lost. That is the trade for getting control back. The same key combo and a few faster variants are covered in the force quit Mac keyboard shortcut guide. If the Force Quit window itself will not open or does nothing, jump to the Terminal section below, or read what to do when Force Quit is not working.

Use Activity Monitor as a Mac task killer

If you came here looking for a "task killer for Mac" or a Task Manager like Windows has, this is it. Activity Monitor lists every running process and lets you end any of them.

1. Open it from Applications → Utilities, or press ⌘Space and type its name.
2. Find the app or process you want gone. Click the % CPU or Memory column header to sort and spot a runaway that is pinning your machine.
3. Select it, click the X button in the toolbar, and choose Force Quit.

Activity Monitor is also the easiest place to read a process ID (the PID column), which you need for the kill command. There is a full walkthrough of Activity Monitor on Mac if you want to know what every column means and how to read CPU, memory, and energy use.

Kill an app from Terminal with killall and kill -9

For the most direct route, or for processes that never open a window, Terminal does the job in one line. Open Terminal from Applications → Utilities and use one of these.

Kill by name with killall. Type killall followed by the app's process name, for example killall Safari. For a name with a space, wrap it in quotes: killall "Google Chrome". That kills the main Chrome process, and its helper processes (named "Google Chrome Helper") shut down with it.

Kill one specific process with kill -9. First get the process ID. Run pgrep Safari, or read the PID column in Activity Monitor. Then run kill -9 followed by that number, for example kill -9 5821. The -9 sends SIGKILL, the signal a process cannot ignore.

Restart the Dock or menu bar. Two killall commands come up a lot: killall Dock restarts the Dock, and killall SystemUIServer restarts the menu bar and its status icons. Both relaunch on their own a second later, so they are a safe fix when the Dock freezes or a menu-bar icon gets stuck. You do not lose any open apps or files.

If a process belongs to the system and refuses to die, put sudo in front, as in sudo killall ProcessName, and enter your password. Be careful with this one: killing a core system process by name can log you out or force a restart.

Kill any app in one click with MEGAKILL

If reaching for a key combo or typing commands feels like work, MEGAKILL turns the kill into a single shot. Hold the shortcut (⌥⌘ by default, and you can change it in the menu) and your cursor becomes a DOOM-style double-barrel shotgun. Click an app's Dock icon or one of its windows and it force-quits instantly. Right-click to reload, two shots per reload. Each kill adds to your streak (KILL, DOUBLE KILL, MEGA KILL), the screen shakes, and a real shotgun blast fires.

There are two ways to shoot. A normal shot kills the whole app. Flip on wound mode from the menu and a shot on a single window closes just that window and leaves the app running, while a shot on the Dock icon still kills the whole app. It will not let you wreck your Mac either: Finder, the Dock, and critical system processes are shielded, so the shotgun ignores them. MEGAKILL runs on macOS 14 (Sonoma) or later and is free for your first 100 kills.

Which method should you use?

Pick by how badly the app is stuck. If it still responds, ⌘Q is cleanest because it saves your work. If it is frozen, go straight to ⌥⌘⎋. If you need to see what is running or grab a PID, open Activity Monitor. For background processes or a quick one-liner, use killall in Terminal. And when you just want it gone without thinking, shoot it with MEGAKILL. When several apps pile up at once, our guide on how to close all apps on Mac covers clearing them in bulk.