FancyZones
Define custom layout zones on your screen and snap windows into them by dragging. FancyZones brings structured tiling to macOS without forcing a tiling window manager on you — zones appear only when you drag, leaving your desktop uncluttered otherwise.
Getting Started
FancyZones is disabled by default. To enable it:
- Open ProToys from your menu bar.
- Navigate to Window Management.
- Toggle FancyZones to On.
Requirements
- Accessibility permission — required to move and resize windows into zones.
Snapping Windows
- Start dragging any window by its title bar.
- The zone overlay panel appears showing your current layout.
- Drag the window over a zone — the zone highlights.
- Drop the window. It snaps to fill that zone.
The zone overlay only appears while you're actively dragging — once you drop, it gets out of the way.
Cycling Layouts
Press ⌥⌘Z to cycle through your saved layouts. A HUD briefly shows the name of the newly active layout each time you press the hotkey.
Built-in Layouts
Ten preset layouts are available:
| Layout | Zones | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Two Columns | 2 | Two equal vertical columns. |
| Three Columns | 3 | Three equal vertical columns. |
| Four Columns | 4 | Four equal vertical columns. |
| Two Rows | 2 | Two equal horizontal rows. |
| Three Rows | 3 | Three equal horizontal rows. |
| 2×2 Grid | 4 | Four equal quadrants. |
| 3×3 Grid | 9 | Nine equal cells. |
| Focus Left | 2 | Large primary zone (2/3) on left, narrow secondary (1/3) on right. |
| Focus Right | 2 | Narrow secondary (1/3) on left, large primary (2/3) on right. |
| Wide Center | 3 | Narrow sidebars (1/5 each) flanking a wide center zone (3/5). |
Custom Layouts
Open ProToys Settings → FancyZones to create your own layouts:
- Draw zones on a canvas by dragging to define each zone's region.
- Double-click a zone label to rename it.
- Delete zones you don't need.
- Save the layout with a custom name.
Keyboard Shortcuts
| Action | Shortcut |
|---|---|
| Cycle through layouts | ⌥⌘Z |
| Focus window left | ⌥⌘← |
| Focus window right | ⌥⌘→ |
| Focus window up | ⌥⌘↑ |
| Focus window down | ⌥⌘↓ |
| Swap window left | ⌥⌘⇧← |
| Swap window right | ⌥⌘⇧→ |
| Cycle window width (38% → 50% → 62%) | ⌥⌘R |
| Center window | ⌥⌘C |
| Maximize / restore toggle | ⌥⌘M |
| Snap to zone 1 | ⌥⌘1 |
| Snap to zone 2 | ⌥⌘2 |
| Snap to zone 3 | ⌥⌘3 |
| Snap to zone 4 | ⌥⌘4 |
| Snap to zone 5 | ⌥⌘5 |
| Snap to zone 6 | ⌥⌘6 |
| Snap to zone 7 | ⌥⌘7 |
| Snap to zone 8 | ⌥⌘8 |
| Snap to zone 9 | ⌥⌘9 |
Settings
| Setting | Description |
|---|---|
| Activate on drag | Show the zone overlay automatically when you start dragging a window. |
| Show numbers on zones | Display a number label inside each zone on the overlay. |
| Keyboard navigation | Enable focus/swap shortcuts (⌥⌘←→↑↓) to move between zones. |
| Snap to zone | Enable numbered zone snap shortcuts (⌥⌘1–9). |
| Window gap | Pixel gap between snapped windows and zone edges. |