How to Make Icons Larger or Smaller on a Mac

The Mac OS lets you crowd more icons onto your screen - or view each folder's contents as a list.

Difficulty: Easy

Instructions

Things You'll Need:

• Mac OS 9.0

1. Make sure you're in the Finder (look for the icon and the word Finder on the right end of the title bar).

2. Click on the Edit menu and choose Preferences. You can choose from three tabs: General, Views and Labels.

3. Click on the General tab to choose either a tight grid spacing for your icons (more items) or a wide grid spacing (a neater arrangement).

4. Click on the Views tab to change the look and placement of icons: Click on Standard View Options For, choose Icons, and select either large or small. You can also choose to have icons snap to an invisible grid so they stay neater, or have icons automatically arranged by name, date modified, date created, size, kind and label.

5. Click on Standard View Options For, choose Buttons, and select either a small or large button size. You can also choose to have buttons snap to an invisible grid, or have icons automatically arranged by name, date modified, date created, size, kind and label.

6. Click on Standard View Options For, choose List, and select a small, medium or large icon size. You can also choose to have the list include columns for date modified, date created, size, kind, label, comments and version.

Tips & Warnings

• Choosing to show your files as buttons lets you click on them just once to launch the application that created them.
• Choosing to show your files as large icons lets some applications save your graphics file as a thumbnail picture, which is a helpful reminder of what it looks like.
• You can change the preferences for just icons by clicking on View and selecting View Options.
• Changes affect all files and folders, so choose preferences that will make your work easier and more easily viewed. You can always change the preferences back.