How to Show the Function Keys on a Mac Touch Bar

For several years, Apple replaced the physical top row of keys on their high-end MacBook Pro laptops with a digital, OLED touchscreen called the “Touch Bar.” Instead of static plastic buttons, the Touch Bar dynamically changed its buttons depending on what app you were using—showing scrubbing controls in Final Cut Pro, or formatting options in Microsoft Word.

While innovative, this design completely eliminated the standard physical Function Keys (F1 through F12). If you use complex software like Adobe Photoshop, or if you are a programmer writing code in a terminal, you often rely heavily on those specific F-keys for keyboard shortcuts. Having them replaced by digital volume sliders is incredibly frustrating.

Fortunately, you do not need to permanently disable the Touch Bar to get your Function keys back. Apple built in a seamless hardware shortcut to summon them on demand.

The Instant Hardware Shortcut

If you only need to press an F-key occasionally (for example, pressing F5 to refresh a specific app), you do not need to change any settings at all.

1. Look at the very bottom-left corner of your physical MacBook keyboard.
2. Locate the Fn (Function) key. (On some keyboards, it also has a small Globe icon printed on it).
3. Press and hold down the Fn key.

The exact millisecond you press the key, the entire digital Touch Bar will instantly switch. All the app-specific volume sliders and formatting buttons will vanish, replaced by a traditional row of standard digital keys from F1 to F12.

Keep holding the Fn key with your left hand, tap the F-key you need on the Touch Bar with your right hand, and then release the Fn key. The Touch Bar will instantly revert to its normal state.

How to Make the F-Keys Permanent

If you use an application where you need the Function keys constantly (like a classic video game, or a heavy coding environment), holding down the Fn key all day is physically painful. You can instruct macOS to permanently lock the Touch Bar into F-key mode.

1. Click the Apple Logo in the top-left corner of the screen.
2. Select System Settings (or System Preferences).
3. Scroll down the left sidebar and click on Keyboard.
4. In the main panel, look for the Touch Bar Settings… button.
5. Click the drop-down menu next to “Touch Bar shows”.
6. Change it from “App Controls” to F1, F2, etc. Keys.

Your Touch Bar is now permanently locked into being a traditional row of Function keys, mimicking the layout of a classic Apple keyboard.