How To Create Custom Folder And Drive Icons For Your Mac

[@KerrieRedgate]

Thank you! I’m such a visual person, this makes my desktop a lot easier to navigate quickly, especially as Stacks doesn’t place folders alphabetically.

[@ElizabethAnneXxx]

Your videos have such clear explanations. Thank you very much! You have yourself a new subscriber!

[@DavidBishopinc]

I had forgotten that this could be done. Haven't thought about it in years. Great video. Thanks for the reminder.

[@Diddldance]

Thank you, so clearly explained and easy to follow :)

[@CraftyOldGit]

Very useful video, thanks. I don't use Pages much and didn't know about the shapes -- they are very useful. Shapes look great with gradient fill & drop shadow.

[@jonathanguillarme3118]

Thank you!! you are so smart, seriously it is years i am loking for that, you are the only one taking about that

[@VaticansHolocaust]

Excellent explanation, especially how to overcome the single-change bug.

[@Torchriver67]

Fast and furiously presented! Good but fast!

[@richard1113]

Great video Gary! And thank you for acknowledging the "2nd change" bug. I thought I had corrupted files.

[@edwardmacdonald5453]

Love your tutorials thank you

[@MsPardal123]

THANK YOU ❤️

[@sylviastagg-giuliano6229]

Thanks! Learned a few things.

[@EduardoGac]

always the best! very nice content!!!! thanks

[@PabloFayadViolin]

Amazing ! Thank you for the tutorial, I was copying and pasting and it didn't work. Now I have a nice personalized folder.

[@MarlaneTubridy]

EXCELLENT! But watch it where you can make notes and write down the steps. Thank you for the video.

[@RonLeblanc]

Ah, very neat. Thank you.

[@hangar4pro]

I forgot you could do this! Thank you for jarring the old memory. One question...how do you revert the folder back to the original?

[@cookiezombie6133]

get info rightclick on icon and press delete worked for me

[@armadilllo]

Wow, you did it the hard way

[@mikeniccum7512]

Very cool idea.

[@LeandroBulacio]

You are a ninja !

[@karimabdin]

You are a damn AMAZING expert person.... you are the best 🌷😘

[@mariovh]

Can you do that 2 on the iPad Pro , let’s say in pages ?

[@Harald111th]

Cool and easy

[@con123]

Thank you, I wanted to customize my folders but didn’t know how

[@flowin100]

Please share this information that I learned the other day. The backspace button will reset the folder back to it's original icon. and you can change them as much as you like. No bug, just backspace. Try it, you'll be surprised.

[@edwardmacdonald5453]

Hi Gary it may be Monterey is different setup but I can not get past the Preview where I can actually add a emotive (ie Numbers ) to the folder. .I just bog down this point and have tried for three days! Ed

[@karenm2669]

This is so cool. Another great procrastination activity 😂😂😂😂

[@michaellwalker8748]

Seems they've fixed the bug because I've been able to change the look of different folders a few times.

[@reggrayston1497]

Hi Gary, is there a way to select an existing folder and change its icon to a custom one that you have created using Automator. I have a bunch of aliased folders and documents and want to highlight those with a specific icon so that these show up. Thanks.

[@no.comment]

Hi Gary, first of all congratulations for your videos, always interesting! 👍 During the tutorial you said something about this bug and that in case of problems with a folder's custom icon, a solution could be to create a new folder and move therein everything that was in the old one. Okay, that's clear. Now, thinking in terms of Time Machine (or other backup software), I suppose that this will cause the backup to be completely redone for all affected files, right? My real question, however, is another. Maybe it's a stupid question, but... will changing the icon of a folder or, worse, of the main disk give the same result (a complete new backup of everything it contains)? Thanks! PS: Sorry for my poor english. 😉

[@macmost]

Not sure how Time Machine will deal with it. You'd have to experiment to see. But changing the icon will not make it a different folder so that won't be an issue. It is just some data stored with the folder.

[@edwardmacdonald5453]

Hi Gary, firstly I use your videos to learn all about my new iMac (2019). I am unable to create custom folder s on my desktop as the system you show is different on my Mac can you do a update Please . and keep is VERY simple (I am 84 ) and love the technology.

[@macmost]

This video shouldn't be that different from what you see (2020). Where are you having trouble?

[@RobertBorley]

This doesn't seem to work with Network Drive Icons in Big Sur. My Mac mini shows up with the correct icon under 'Network' initially, then quickly switches to a monitor icon. Nothing I try succeeds to switch it back. Weird thing is that opening the preview app open file dialogue (with the finder window open in the background) forces Mac to show the correct icon again. But as soon as the Preview open file dialogue closes, the icons revert to the Monitor Icons. V strange behaviour.

[@sbeckas]

Hi-BigSur does not have a size change to 500-largest is 200 for emoji.

[@chhomchheng123]

How to apply photo on icon? plesae

[@joku8547]

I tried doing this but it just pops up with the PNG icon, please help!

[@macmost]

Follow along closely with the steps in the video to make sure you are doing everything needed.

[@MarlaneTubridy]

Any chance you can update for Ventura? Having some problems on Ventura. Thank you Gary.

[@macmost]

Where are you running into issues?

[@TJDawgs72]

I have a new Mac Mini with Big Sur...seems a little different from your exact directions. Plus I can't get the text size as large as you can...maxes out at 200. But it still works though...thanks a lot. Too bad Apple just doesn't allow you to choose from different folder designs from the get go. Seems like something Apple would have thought of already...oh well.

[@gremista]

Same here, can't get more than 200pt, and so the image on the folder look too small

[@unicornonthecob4302]

@@gremista Same here.

[@tbrownATL]

Same Problem

[@portfedh]

Great Tip. Thanks for sharing! If you customize a shared drobpox folder, will others see the customization as well?

[@macmost]

Do you mean the Dropbox folder in your Public folder? Or do you mean the cloud service "Dropbox?" I don't believe the cloud service supports things like this, but the regular Dropbox should. Either way, just try it.

[@jonhermannsson9231]

I know how to change drive and folder icons - but there seems to be a bug in Catalina - it does not allow you to change - was able few months ago to change but have forgotten the workaround for Catalina - Can you make a video or explain what the workaround is to change a drive icon for Catalina

[@luciemcadams9016]

The paste feature doesn't work for me. Using the new Catalina.

[@GK-ec5df]

Can you use Adobe Illustrator or Photoshop without having to spend 29.99 for the Acorn app?

[@EduardoGac]

I tried to creat a custom folder inside my SSD external drive BUT it doesn't appear. Is there a way to fix it? thanks

[@samrust8020]

You are professional. I would like to mention the below if you do not mind: Is there a way to copy shapes online or from Microsoft word if Pages app is not installed on my laptop. Will these folder keep the new icon if i backup to Time Machine to another laptop please?

[@macmost]

I don't think the folder icons will transfer to the new computer, but try it.

[@photoboutiquestudio4237]

great

[@manart6506]

3:20 I tried to use text but it doesn’t let me use font size bigger than 200pt.

[@franzsheep]

Hey Gary, thanks for the nice tip! One question: is there a way to also have these icons show up in the sidebar of the finder window? To me, it seems that the sidebar will still show the original icon regardless of the new custom icon that you set. Please let me know your thoughts @macmostvideo :)

[@macmost]

The sidebar doesn't show that type of icon, just a symbol to the left of the item.

[@wanderlust101]

It's interesting... I've made drive icons for my external HDs but one of the drives does NOT let me change it. The others worked; they are all the same drive from OWC... what's with that?

[@macmost]

Perhaps that drive is formatted differently?

[@eolitek]

On my M1 Macbook Pro in Preview the font size is stuck at a maximum of 200 pts. Too small for adding emojis. Intel mac not a problem

[@macmost]

Depends on the version of Preview. I don't know why they lowered the maximum size. You can always use 512x512 icons instead.

[@RyanTSmithAttorney]

Great video! Happen to know how you can customize folders in a business Dropbox account?

[@macmost]

Since they are on a server, I don't know if you can. Certainly anyone you share them with wouldn't see those customizations.

[@RyanTSmithAttorney]

@@macmost Thank you for the quick reply!

[@Hovisssss]

I'm looking for a way to also have the customized picture as your icon IN the finder sidebar. For example - the "music" icon is a note, the "pictures" icon is camera. Is this possible to change?? Thanks!

[@macmost]

No, those are different. You can't change those.

[@justsendit8506]

Fun folder tips, Gary! 📂 Maybe just a small bug... Did you happen to notice that older alias icons don’t seem to update automatically even though they still point to their originals? When I saw this, I just created new (clean) aliases from the new folders.

[@macmost]

Haven't noticed that. I wonder if those were pre-APFS format aliases?

[@firasalalwani3927]

This works fine, but it doesn't seem to work on the cloud (iCloud, Google Drive or Onedrive).. When change a folder icon on computer A it doesn't change on computer B.. Can I solve this problem, so that the change works on every mac device? Thanks!!!

[@macmost]

You are right. It works only on the local Mac.

[@ElizabethAnneXxx]

Is there any way of customising the small icons in the finder side bar? Eg, the music tab has a musical note, the pictures has a little camera. I recently added my OneDrive folder to the side and it's a plain folder, can I change this to a cloud to look like the iCloud icon? Do I make any sense at all? Sorry if I don't!

[@macmost]

No, those are part of the system and can't be customized.

[@Agent_Lane]

Is there any way to make it so that the newly created icon will be the one applied to any new folder created ? Or is the copy & paste process for each folder the only way to go ?

[@macmost]

You have to apply it each time.

[@guandianrenming8159]

great video, but I have applied ugly folder icon for my folder

[@Work1963]

So everything worked but when I go back to undo everything and start over, it will not delete my first few changes, so I’m stuck with the folder that I’ve created. I can’t get back to a blue folder.

[@macmost]

Just copy another one in that case. Start over.

[@Work1963]

@@macmost I try to, but when I go back to new from clipboard, it pulls that same folder up that I have edited

[@keithyakouboff8755]

I tried this, but it does not copy the transparency info in my PNG file. My icon has a white background.

[@macmost]

Make sure the PNG is indeed transparent. Try following along with this example exactly, maybe with another graphic?

[@keithyakouboff8755]

@@macmost I did... and that worked. Thank you :)

[@davidsummers2616]

It’s still bug you can only hey something once you can’t change it after that as he said in the video

[@BarTabMag]

Any idea why this wouldn't work on Mac 10.14.6? I drag and drop and cut and pasta and all I get is a generic 'PNG' icon.

[@macmost]

Sounds like you are experiencing this issue: kzbin.info/www/bejne/naDZimOqiNecl6s

[@akbc3247]

Is there a way to customize folders like this on ipadOS?

[@macmost]

No, sorry.

[@akbc3247]

@@macmost oh thats a shame, it'd be nice to have them customized there too. Thanks for the answer

[@kencollins1186]

This technique doesn't seem to work on Big Sur. Preview doesn't appear to let the text in a text box to get larger than 200%.

[@macmost]

200 pt seems to be a limit, you are right. But you can use any image editing app you want instead. You can even use Keynote with a 1024x1024 slide, add text, emoji and graphics as you like, and export as an image. Lots of options.

[@kencollins1186]

@@macmost I found a solution. Instead of taking the 1024x1024 folder icon, I used the 512x512 icon. Then the 200% image is small, but looks okay.

[@macmost]

@@kencollins1186 Good idea if you have no other image editing app around.

[@edwardmacdonald5453]

Hi Gary , I gave up after trying for a week .regards Ed

[@fabricemikobi7608]

It seems like it's not possible anymore on BigSur

[@macmost]

Definitely is.

[@sandcat-maurice]

@@macmost Actually not sure it is. On the Mac itself I can create custom folders, but the folders on my NAS cannot be edited. Works perfectly fine under previous versions (I have bootable MacOS images), but not on Big Sur

[@zyghom]

the bug has been resolved - you can change any times now

[@RORVS]

👏👏👏👏👏

[@GWoldstuff]

I have a favourite page, want to change the icons not the favourite page

[@Notmy00000]

🙏🙏🙏🙏🙏🙏🙏🙏

[@check36]

pls keep video short it is damm lengthy!!

[@andyhelstrip5002]

That was not very easy to follow. Thanks anyway.