How to open two Finder windows side by side on a Mac

In Finder, press Command-N to open a second window, then give each window half of the screen. On macOS Sequoia or later, drag each window to the left or right edge until a tile outline appears, or choose Window > Move & Resize > Left & Right. On earlier versions, use Split View from the green button, or resize the two windows by hand.

Open the second window

Finder will show as many windows as you ask for. The part people miss is that a new one has to be requested; double-clicking a folder reuses the window you are already in.

1. Click the Finder icon in the Dock, or click the desktop, so Finder is the app in front.
2. Press Command-N, or choose File > New Finder Window.
3. Navigate the new window to the folder you want to move files into.

The new window opens to whatever is chosen in Finder > Settings > General, under New Finder windows show.

To open one particular folder in its own window, Control-click it and choose Open in New Window. If the menu says Open in New Tab instead, hold the Option key and the command switches. Which one appears first depends on the “Open folders in tabs instead of new windows” checkbox in the same General settings.

If you already have the two folders open as tabs in one window, click the tab you want to separate and choose Window > Move Tab to New Window.

Tile the two windows on macOS Sequoia or later

macOS 15 Sequoia added window tiling, and it works well for Finder. There are four ways to do the same thing.

• Drag to an edge. Drag the first window by its title bar until the pointer reaches the left edge of the screen. An outline shows where the window will land. Let go, then do the same with the second window on the right edge.
• Use the menu. With one Finder window in front, choose Window > Move & Resize > Left & Right. The front window takes the left half and the window you used just before it takes the right. If the wrong window fills the other half, click the second Finder window, click the first one again, and repeat the command.
• Use the green button. Hold the pointer over the green button in the top-left corner of a window. A panel of layouts appears; click the left-half or right-half icon.
• Use the keyboard. Fn-Control-Left Arrow sends the front window to the left half, and Fn-Control-Right Arrow sends it to the right.

If dragging to an edge does nothing, open System Settings > Desktop & Dock, scroll to the Windows section, and turn on “Drag windows to screen edges to tile”. The same section has “Tiled windows have margins”; turn that off if you want the two windows to meet with no gap between them.

Use Split View on earlier versions

On macOS Sonoma, hold the pointer over the green button of one Finder window and choose Tile Window to Left of Screen. The window snaps to the left half, and the other open windows are shown on the right. Click the second Finder window and it fills the remaining space.

Split View is a full-screen mode, which brings two side effects. The menu bar and the Dock hide until you move the pointer to the edge of the screen, and the pair of windows lives in its own Space, away from your other apps. To leave, move the pointer to the top of the screen so the window buttons appear, then click the green button. The other window stays in full screen on its own; exit it the same way.

If that is more ceremony than the job deserves, drag the windows by their edges until each takes roughly half the screen.

Make half-width windows easier to work in

Two Finder windows on a laptop screen are narrow. A few adjustments help.

• Switch to list view. Press Command-2 in each window. List view shows more files in less width than icons do.
• Hide the sidebar in the destination window. Choose View > Hide Sidebar. You are only dropping into that window, so the sidebar is spending space you need.
• Show the path bar. Choose View > Show Path Bar, or press Option-Command-P. With two similar windows open, the path along the bottom tells you which is which.
• Aim for empty space. In list view, a file dropped on a folder row goes inside that folder. Drop on a blank area, or on the column headers, to put it in the folder the window is showing. Why a dropped file lands in the wrong folder in Finder list view explains the trap.

Between two folders on the same drive, a drag moves the file. Between two drives, it copies. Hold Option while you drop to force a copy, or Command to force a move. Copy, move, or alias when you drag a file on a Mac covers the modifier keys in full.

When two windows are more than the job needs

A second window exists for one reason: to give the drag somewhere to land. There are lighter ways to provide that.

Tabs are the built-in one. Press Command-T for a new tab, open the destination in it, and drag files onto the tab itself. How to move a file between Finder tabs on a Mac walks through it.

Ledge removes the second window entirely. Drag the file up to the notch at the top of the screen and let go; it lands on a shelf that drops from the notch and stays there. Then use the same Finder window to navigate to the destination, open the shelf with Option-Space or a click on the notch, and drag the file down into the folder. Finder receives the file itself, so it moves there, the same as a drag between two windows.

This suits a few situations in particular:

• A laptop screen. Two half-width Finder windows are cramped. One full-width window and a shelf is not.
• Files from several folders. Shelve each one as you find it, then drop the whole set on the destination at once.
• A destination that is not Finder. The same file dropped on a chat app uploads, and dropped on a terminal it arrives as its path.

Ledge needs macOS 14 Sonoma or later. On a Mac without a notch, the shelf lives at the top center of the screen. It has no account and no cloud, and it is free for 14 days, then $19 once.

If your goal is to compare two folders rather than move files between them, two windows side by side is still the right tool. A shelf holds files; it does not show you what a folder contains.

Questions

Why do my folders keep opening in tabs instead of new windows?

Finder > Settings > General has a checkbox named “Open folders in tabs instead of new windows”. Uncheck it, or hold Option while choosing the command from the Control-click menu to get the other behavior for one folder.

Can I tile more than two Finder windows?

On macOS Sequoia or later, yes. Window > Move & Resize > Quarters arranges four windows, and the green button panel offers corner positions for single windows.

How do I get back to a single Finder window?

Choose Window > Merge All Windows to turn every open Finder window into a tab of one window, or close the extras with Command-W.