There are numerous reasons why you might need to refresh a MacBook. Though it’s a kind of thing that you usually do on your web browsers, sometimes you need to refresh the applications on your macOS as well. Basically, there are two kinds of refresh tasks that you can perform on your system. The first one is the standard refresh, which just reloads the webpage, the second one is hard refresh. In this blog post, we’ll cover both. So, make sure you stick to the end to understand the difference!
Why Do We Need To Refresh our MacBook Air?
In case the content you are trying to access gets stuck while loading the page, you can perform the refresh action and resolve the unnecessary blocks. You can refresh the browsers you are using or applications that show content hosted on a remote server. These apps include the App Store, Podcasts, Music, and TV.
How To Refresh Page On MacBook Air ? | On Web Browsers
Well, Mac users who’ve switched from Windows OS are accustomed to pressing the F5 Function Key to refresh the browser or a webpage. But using this shortcut on Mac shows a completely different result. On Mac, you need to press Command + R to perform a refresh and this applies to the majority of the web browsers as well you are using on your machine.
When Hard Refresh is performed, your web browser clears its local copy of the webpage cache and simply downloads the latest version from the site’s server.
Follow the instructions stated below to perform both standard and hard refresh on your browser:
On Safari Web Browser:
You have two ways to initiate the refresh action on Safari web browser:
- Hit the curved arrow icon located at the top right corner of the Address bar.
- Press the shortcut keys – Command + R.
To perform a hard refresh on your Safari browser, simply use the shortcut = Command + Option + R.
On Google Chrome Browser:
You have two ways to initiate the refresh action on the Google Chrome web browser:
- Hit the curved arrow icon located at the top left corner of the Address bar.
- Press the shortcut keys – Command + R.
To perform a hard refresh on your Safari browser, simply use the shortcut = Command + Shift + R.
On Mozilla Firefox Browser
You have two ways to initiate the refresh action on the Firefox web browser:
- Hit the curved arrow icon located at the top left corner of the Address bar.
- Press the shortcut keys – Command + R.
To perform a hard refresh on your Safari browser, simply use the shortcut = Command + Shift + R.
How To Refresh MacBook Air? | Mac Apps
If you are facing constant trouble while downloading attachments from your Mail or you notice that your Messages app doesn’t show the recent messages, it’s probably time to perform Mail and Messages refresh. Follow the instructions provided below to learn how it’s done:
Refresh Mail App:
- Hit the shortcut keys – Command + Shift + N.
- Now hit the Mailbox menu and select the option “Get All New Mail”.
Refresh Messages App:
If you are facing issues in receiving recent messages, then the most appropriate solution is to refresh your application by forcing sync. For that, you need to do the following.
- Open Messages App and navigate to the Menu, choose Preferences.
- From the Preferences window, head towards the iMessage tab.
- Check the box next to “Enable Messages in iCloud”.
- Hit the Sync Now button!
Additional Tip: How To Refresh Your Mac For Improved Speed & Performance?
In case your MacBook Air is causing more issues than just an occasional web page loading problem or apps not showing recent changes, then it’s probably the best time to give your machine a fresh start. We recommend using CleanMyMac for this purpose. It’s equipped with an advanced set of modules related to cleaning system junk, unwanted/old/large mail attachments, removing apps you no longer use, and performing a variety of optimization tasks.
It features brilliant tools to free up RAM, update outdated apps, extensions and shred confidential files making them completely unrecoverable.
CleanMyMac is an excellent Mac Cleaning Software that holds the potential to find all the discarded bits and bobs your system generates like user caches, log files, temp files, unused language files, and more. It further eliminates them so that you can recover gigabytes of occupied storage space on your Mac. Its single scan will certainly provide a noticeable performance boost!
So, this was our complete guide on how to refresh a MacBook Pro? If you have any queries or suggestions, feel free to share them with us in the comments section below!
Frequently Asked Questions:
Q1. How to refresh Mail on MacBook Air?
Here’s what you need to do to refresh a page on Mac while using Mail.
- Hit the shortcut keys – Command + Shift + N.
- Now hit the Mailbox menu and select the option “Get All New Mail”.
Q2. How do I put my MacBook Air in recovery mode?
Follow the steps below to restart a Mac in Recovery Mode.
- Hit the Apple logo, located on the top-left corner of the screen.
- Click on the Restart button from the drop-down menu.
- Instantly hold down the Command + R keys simultaneously, until you see the Apple logo.
- Now, you will be presented with Recovery Mode options.
Q3. How to reset MacBook Air to factory settings?
Well, it’s a pretty straightforward process to reset MacBook Air:
- Shut down your Machine.
- Switch it on and instantly press and hold the keys – Option + Command + P + R.
- Now, release the keys after 20 seconds.
- You’ve successfully reset your MacBook Air to factory settings!
For more details, you can read this guide: Step-By-Step Guide: Factory Reset MacBook Pro/MacBook Air
Q4. How to refresh a page on Safari on macOS?
Follow any of the ways mentioned below to refresh on Mac using Safari browser:
- Hit the curved arrow icon located at the top right corner of the Address bar.
- Press the shortcut keys – Command + R.