With screens so big these days, it's easy to lose sight of such a small mouse cursor. Fortunately, Apple introduced a quick way to visually locate the cursor in 2015. Here's how to use it.
If you have lost track of the mouse pointer arrow on your screen, Quickly wave your mouse or trackpad finger back and forth. The cursor will momentarily grow much larger on the screen, making your location more visually obvious.
When I stop shaking, the cursor will return to its normal size. This feature works on all versions of macOS, starting with macOS 10.11 Captain. We also tested it on macOS 11.0 Big Sur.
How to disable the mouse pointer “Shake to find”
Shaking the cursor to find it is a useful function, but if you activate it too often by accident and find it annoying, it's easy to disable.
Simply open System Preferences by clicking on the Apple menu and selecting “System preferences”. Go to “Accessibility” and then click “Screen” in the sidebar. In the tab “Cursor”, uncheck “Shake the mouse pointer to locate”.
Thereafter, Quit System Preferences and you will have no more surprise giant mouse cursors. Re-enabling it is as simple as revisiting this option and checking the box again “Shake the mouse pointer to locate”.
How to permanently increase the size of the mouse cursor
If you lose your mouse cursor many times, you can permanently increase the pointer size. Just open System Preferences, click on “Accessibility”, then select “Screen” in the sidebar.
In the tab “Cursor”, use the slider “Cursor size” to increase or decrease the size of the mouse pointer.
When you have it configured as you like, close System Preferences and your cursor will always be that size. It feels good to be able to see it again, No need to shake it!
RELATED: How to make the mouse cursor bigger or smaller on your Mac
