How to Use a Windows Keyboard on a Mac Without a Headache
Maybe you’ve brought your MacBook to visit relatives and set up a temporary workspace using whatever you had at home. Maybe you bought a fancy mechanical keyboard for your Mac, not realizing it had a Windows layout. Either way, the first time you try to use a keyboard shortcut, you’ll be disappointed.
For example, whenever you reflexively try to use a keyboard shortcut that includes the Command key, you end up pressing Alt . Everything will go wrong on your Mac, and you’ll be swearing. The thing is, you don’t have to relearn a new keyboard or download third-party apps to fix it. The problem can be solved by simply changing some settings directly in macOS.
Why Windows Keyboards Are So Annoying on macOS
Mac and Windows keyboards aren’t all that different, except for one important thing: the modifier keys. Modern Mac keyboards have the Globe/Fn , Control , Option , and Command keys in the lower-left corner, in that order; modern Windows keyboards have the Ctrl , Fn , Windows , and Alt keys, usually in that order. (There aren’t many keyboards designed specifically for Linux devices, but those that do typically use the same order, and call the Windows key something else.)
These keys are “translated” by the Mac, as Apple documents here . Ctrl becomes Control , Windows becomes Command , and Alt becomes Option .
This translation makes some logical sense, because the keyboard shortcuts in both systems are quite similar, and there is a difference. The problem is that the layout is completely wrong. Even if you understand the translation, muscle memory will still confuse you. So I recommend changing the keys in the system settings.
How to (mostly) fix the problem
To switch your Windows keyboard layout, open System Preferences and go to Keyboard . Click the Keyboard Shortcuts button to open the panel, then open the Modifier Keys section on the left sidebar.
Be sure to select your current Windows keyboard from the drop-down list at the top of the window, otherwise you’ll have to remap all the keyboards you don’t want. Now you can remap the modifier keys. I recommend mapping Option to Command and Command to Option – this will return you to the layout you’re used to.
The main problem with this setting, in my experience, is that it doesn’t allow you to remap the Fn key for a Windows keyboard this way, even though it looks like it in this window. On a Mac, this key can be used to launch the emoji picker, for example, and as a modifier for custom shortcuts. You can also use this key to use alternate functions for certain keys, such as using the top row of keys as traditional function keys (F1, F2, etc.) instead of their primary purpose (brightness, playback, volume, etc.). The Fn key on Windows keyboards only allows you to access the alternate functions of the keys, and as far as I can tell, it does so without sending any signal to the computer. This means that you can still use the top row of keys as traditional function keys on your Mac, for example, but you can’t use it to launch the emoji picker or for any other shortcuts. If you need access to the Globe/Fn key on your Mac for these purposes, you might want to consider remapping the Caps Lock key to it.
It’s not perfect, but having the Command and Option keys positioned correctly can help you maintain your sanity. Try it the next time you use a Windows-oriented keyboard on a Mac.