How To Uninstall Apps On Mac [Purchased in and out of App store]

Epost100’s quick Answer to Uninstall Apps on Mac:

Purchased in App store:
1. Open Launchpad
2. Long press on the App
3. Click on the x mark at the top left
4. Confirm deleting the app.

Purchased out of App store:
1. Open Finder
2. Click on Applications
3. Right-click the app and choose to move to Bin.

Read more to Remove apps from your Mac.

If you are a macOS device user, you know the biggest problem with the storage especially if you are using earlier models with a lower storage variant. You definitely need to know how To Uninstall Programs On Mac or else you are going to have some seriously constant storage space management issues.

You will constantly have low storage issues and it’s a problem that you have to keep deleting stuff once in a while like apps, cache, backups and many more. Im not even joking about the backup. I have personally deleted backups just to manage my 256GB storage in my MacBook Pro (late 2015 model). I still use the same computer and I feel the pain if you are going through something similar.

Related: How to Delete Apps on iOS 14

How To Uninstall Programs On Mac

Apps could be installed in your mac computer by two different ways. One is by downloading them from the App Store for macOS or by downloading the software and manually installing it. The procedure to unistall for both are a little different. I have described the steps for either of them here. The steps are not reversible, so please be careful when you delete apps from your mac.

Apps installed from outside the App Store

1. Open the Finder by clicking on the icon in the Dock or by searching via Spotlight.
   
2. As soon as the Finder window is open, click on Applications in the side menu.
   
   
   
3. In the list of applications, look for the application that you are specifically trying to uninstall.
   
4. Right Click on the app when you find it and Choose Move to Bin. This will delete all the application related files and folders to the Bin.
   
   
   
5. Go to Bin. Right-click on the application related folder. Choose Delete Immediately.
   
   
   
6. This will permanently delete the application from your computer. You will be asked to confirm before it’s deleted forever. Press Delete.

Did you know? You can Record Your MAC Screen with Audio in 3 ways

Apps purchased in the App Store

Launchpad has the grid of all the apps that you have directly installed from the App Store. If you have installed the app from you the App Store you will find it here.

If not, it was downloaded and installed manually.

1. Open Launchpad by pressing on Shift+F3 or by clicking on the Launchpad icon on the dock.
   
2. Press and hold the icon of the application you are trying to delete. Now you will be in the jiggle mode. Jiggle Mode refers to the state where you can actually rearrange/delete apps from the Launchpad. You must have seen something like this when you tried to rearrange or delete apps on your iPhone.
   
3. Once they are in the Jiggle mode, you will see the x button on the top right corner of the application icon you are trying to delete. If you don’t see a Delete button, the app can’t be removed from Launchpad. You will have to follow the steps from Apps installed from outside the App Store section at the top.
   
   
   
4. Click on the x button at the top left corner of the App icon.
   
5. This will show a popup right near the app icon as below to ask for confirmation to delete the app from your installed macOS Applications.
   
   

Also, please be aware of installing apps from outside the App Store. Sometimes, even trusted developers choose to post their apps outside of the app store for compatibility and architecture choices. It’s always a good practice to make sure that you are downloading a verified software from a verified source developed by a verified publisher/developer.

Apple does not include in warranty if your macOS installed in your Mac computer is corrupted by unverified software built by unverified developers.