← All tips

Stop the desktop appearing every time you click the wallpaper

By default a click on any visible scrap of wallpaper sweeps all your windows aside. You can restrict it.

Click a sliver of wallpaper between two windows and every window slides out of the way to show the desktop. It is meant to be handy. In practice it fires by accident all day, and you have to click again to get your work back.

Go to System Settings → Desktop & Dock and find Show Desktop. Change it from Always on Wallpaper Click to Only in Stage Manager on Click.

Now the click only works when Stage Manager is on — that is, when you have deliberately asked for that way of arranging windows. The rest of the time a stray click on the wallpaper does nothing at all.

On macOS Sequoia and earlier, the same setting is called Click wallpaper to reveal desktop, with the values Always and Only in Stage Manager.


Related tips