How To Batch Rename Files On A Mac With This Hidden Trick

Here is a little Mac shortcut that I have found to be super helpful, as it saves me a ton of time. It involves renaming a bunch of files, documents, media, or other type of items inside a folder on a Mac.

If you just had one or two files that needed to be renamed, it would be easy enough to change the name one at a time. But if your folder contains many items, then renaming them individually would be a huge, tedious, and time-consuming task.

Luckily, Apple has made it easy for you to rename all the files at once – in bulk – using Finder.

I use it mostly for renaming a folder full of photos from a gibberish string of characters to a descriptive name of the event pictured in those photos. But once you see how this powerful little shortcut can improve your personal productivity, you will find ways to use it for lots of things.

Common Reasons to Rename Files In A Folder on a Mac

As I mentioned before, a common example of why you might want to rename all the files in a folder at once is to organize your photo files from a digital camera. Your camera names those files with a generic string of numbers and letters.

I know digital cameras are ancient history. But we all have photos from digital cameras sitting around on hard drives or SD cards that need to be organized.

Instead of keeping the generic name the camera applied, it is more meaningful to have each photo carry a descriptive title – perhaps the name of the event or the place.

Our smartphones also assign random number titles to our photos so you can use it on more recent data too.

What Your End Result Will Look Like

Before I jump into the step by step process, I want to describe what your end result will look like. This will help you to organize the items that you want to rename.

Basically, we are changing the name of the items in your folder from what they are currently called, to a series of items that all have the same name and a different ending number as in a sequence.

For example, let’s say that you have photos from a visit to the Grand Canyon – but they are all numbered randomly from your phone or camera. You can use this shortcut to rename all of them at once to something more descriptive and sequential.

I personally like using a consistent file naming convention that starts with the date in yyyy-mm-dd format, followed by the name of the event (ie – Grand-Canyon) followed by a sequential number (-1,-2,-3,-4, etc).

So your end result will be renaming a series of photos from something like: x6083.jpg, x6084.jpg, and x6085.jpg to

• 2026-10-04-Grand-Canyon-01.jpg,
• 2026-10-04-Grand-Canyon-02.jpg, and
• 2026-10-04-Grand-Canyon-03.jpg, and so on.

The beauty is that you can change all of the names in one go, no matter how many files are in that folder. This is how you do it.

Step 1: Open the Folder That Holds The Files You Want To Rename

The first thing you want to do, is to collect the files that you want to rename into a single folder on your Mac. Make sure that the files are relevant to each other so that the title that you choose is applicable to all the files inside the folder. Make sure that you choose a descriptive name for your folder as well (it is not necessary to this process but it will help to keep your data organized).

Use Finder to open the folder that contains all the files that you want to rename.

Step 2: Highlight the Items You Want To Rename With Your Cursor

Next, drag your cursor over the files that you want to rename to highlight them.

You don’t have to choose everything in your folder. As you practice using this process, you may find other uses, where you just want to rename a few items depending on what you are doing.

Step 3: Open Settings for Your Finder Window

Next, click on the settings icon at the top of your Finder window.

In more recent versions of MacOS – this is a circle icon with 3 dots in the center. If you are running earlier versions of OSX then it will be the gear icon. (However, note that OSX versions earlier than Yosemite do not have this capability.)

In the drop down menu you will see an option called “Rename”. (If you forgot to highlight any files at all – you will not see this option – so make sure to select the files you want to rename before clicking the Settings icon.)

Step 4: Click on Rename.

When you click the “Rename” option it will bring up a pop up box with some renaming options.

These are the selections that I make (although you can play with the options to create a naming convention that works for you):

• First box: Format
• Name Format: Name and Index
• Where: after name
• Custom Format: the-name-you-want-to-give-your-files- (I always end the name with a “-” dash. This makes it so that there is a dash between the last word in the name and number that you assign.)
• Start Numbers at: 1 or 01

In the bottom left hand corner of the pop up box – you will see what the file names will look like with all the different options.

When you are happy with your naming convention – click Rename and all your files will be renamed.

One thing to note – in the Custom Format (where you type out the names of your files) I always use a trailing dash at the end so that the sequential numbers are not mushed up against the last word in the name.

The Fastest Way to Rename a File on a Mac

In my opinion this really is the fastest way to rename files on a Mac all at once. And I love that it is baked right into Finder! You can use this process to easily rename all the files in a folder sequentially and clean up your computer. It truly is a time saver.

If you are on a mission to organize your digital life, be sure to check out our Complete Guide to Digital Organization here for more tips, ideas, and shortcuts to bring order to your chaos in no time.