How to Change The Default Filetype Mac Screenshots

Taking a screenshot is the best way to share to your colleague, IT supports who can help fix a problem of computer or share on social network like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram,… MacOS system will save the screenshots as PNG files by default which are good if you want the image with the high quality. However, the disadvantage is the PNG screenshots file often be big in size.

Although you may open the png file by using Apple’s Preview app, or the third-party image editor and easily to convert PNG into JPG, GIF, PDF, TIFF, there is still the command line which will help you to save a screenshot as the image format which you want.

How to change the Default Filetype from PNG to JPG

Just open Terminal from Spotlight or LauchPad, then type or paste the following command below and then press Return button.

Changing the Filetype from PNG to JPG

defaults write com.apple.screencapture type jpg; killall SystemUIServer

Changing the Filetype from PNG to GIF

defaults write com.apple.screencapture type gif; killall SystemUIServer

Changing the Filetype from PNG to TIFF

defaults write com.apple.screencapture type tiff; killall SystemUIServer

Changing the Filetype from PNG to PDF

defaults write com.apple.screencapture type PDF; killall SystemUIServer

Back to PNG

To set it all back to PNG, quickly place ‘png’ at the end there.

defaults write com.apple.screencapture type png; killall SystemUIServer

How to Take a Screenshot on macOS

For a detailed guide, check out our take a screenshot on Mac.

If you’ve looked for this post helpful, let share it with your friends or colleagues or leave us a comment here.