If you recently migrated from a Windows PC to an Apple Mac, you might notice a strange typographical behavior: whenever you type two spaces in rapid succession, macOS automatically deletes the spaces and replaces them with a period (full stop) followed by a single space. Apple borrowed this feature directly from the iPhone’s iOS operating system, where double-tapping the spacebar is a beloved shortcut for quickly ending a sentence on a tiny touchscreen keyboard.
However, on a full-sized physical Mac keyboard, this feature is often more of a hindrance than a help. If you write code, format text documents with manual spacing, or simply learned to type in an era where two spaces after a period was the standard rule, this automatic correction will drive you crazy. Fortunately, you can turn it off.
How to Stop the Double-Space to Period Shortcut
You can easily disable this automatic text replacement in your Mac’s Keyboard settings.
- Click the Apple Logo in the top left corner of your screen.
- Select System Settings (or System Preferences on older versions of macOS).
- Scroll down the left-hand sidebar and click on Keyboard.
- Look for the Text Input section and click the Edit… button next to “Input Sources.”
- A new window will slide down. Look for the toggle switch labeled Add period with double-space.
- Click the toggle to turn it to the Off position (the switch will turn gray).
- Click Done.
Your Mac will instantly stop hijacking your spacebar. You can now type as many consecutive spaces as you need, in any application, without macOS attempting to automatically end your sentences.