How to Change MacBook Wallpaper?

How to Change MacBook Wallpaper? – Getting Started

One of the quickest and easiest ways to customize a MacBook is by changing the wallpaper on the desktop to something more appealing.

You can even change it to a solid background if that’s your style; overall, the choice is yours.

So why would anyone want to change the wallpaper on their MacBook? After a while, you can get tired of Apple’s customary mountain or night sky range of photos.

Either way, it’s easy to change your wallpaper to another one of Apple’s preloaded wallpapers or something you love. How do you change the desktop wallpaper on a MacBook?

You can use one of four ways; use system preferences, the photos application, the Finder tool, or drag and drop an image you’ve downloaded from the web on your MacBook desktop. Let’s look at these four methods in detail.

Change MacBook Wallpaper: System Preferences

Start by opening the Apple menu by clicking on the Apple logo situated in the upper-left corner of your MacBook’s screen.
Next, click on ‘System Preferences’ to open the System Preferences tab.

How to Change MacBook Wallpaper

Then click on ‘Desktop and Screen Saver.’

Next, click on the Desktop tab situated at the top of the tab.
Then click on ‘Desktop Pictures.’
Next, click on the image you want to use as your desktop background. The background images are situated on the right side of the tab.

You can also choose colors to set the desktop wallpaper to a solid color. If your MacBook is running macOS Mojave or higher, you can also set a dynamic wallpaper that can automatically change from light during the day to dark at night.
To modify the background of your own photos, click on the plus (+) sign. This button is situated in the bottom-left corner of the tab.
Next, select the folder containing your photo and click ‘Choose.’

Then click on the image. Note that if you don’t want your photos to be erased, ensure they are in a safe place. Don’t put them on your desktop or in the downloads folder.
To rotate the image, check the box adjacent to ‘Change picture.’ Note that you need to have chosen more than one photo to rotate background images.
Finally, select how often you want the wallpaper to rotate. You can also shuffle the picture order by checking the box adjacent to ‘Random order.’

Change MacBook Wallpaper: Photos App

Start by opening the photo application. If you have more than one display, ensure the app is open in the display whose wallpaper you want to change.
Next, right-click on the photo you want to use as your wallpaper
Then click on ‘Share.’
Finally, click on ‘Set Desktop Picture.’

How to Change MacBook Wallpaper

Change MacBook Wallpaper: Finder

Start by opening a Finder window and search for the photo you want to use.
Next, right-click on the photo.
Then click on ‘Set Desktop Picture.’

Note that you can use this method on a photo you’ve seen on the internet. However, you first need to download it on your MacBook.

Change MacBook Wallpaper: Drag and Drop Image in Desktop

This is perhaps the fastest way to set any photo as your MacBook wallpaper

Start by dragging and dropping the photo you want to use on the desktop.
Next, right-click on the image.
Finally, click “Set Desktop Picture.’

How to Change MacBook Wallpaper

This is the best way to set a screenshot or an image you’ve been sent via email or iMessage as your MacBook desktop background.

MacBook Desktop Wallpaper Change Problems

Are you encountering issues changing your MacBook’s desktop background? Check out these suggestions; they might help fix the issue.

If you want to use a photo you’ve downloaded from the web as your MacBook desktop background, ensure it’s saved in an accepted format such as JPG, PICT, or PNG.

Ensure there are images in the ‘Desktop Pictures’ folder. To do this, press and hold ‘Command + Shift + G’ and type ‘/Library/Desktop Pictures’ in the pop-up window.

If the desktop background you’ve set doesn’t appear, try switching off your computer or restarting it to ensure the photo is stored on the MacBook boot disk.

As per a statement made by Apple, photos stored on a different partition might load well after rebooting your Mac.

However, this is dependent on how fast the partition containing the images becomes available after a boot or reboot.

Final Thought

As you can see, there are several ways you can use to change the current wallpaper on your MacBook.

There is no method proven to work necessarily better than the others, so just pick one and change your MacBook wallpaper to something you like.