How to Use and Customize a Third-Party Keyboard on Your Mac
Using a Third-Party Keyboard With Your Mac
Apple offers two flavors of the external keyboard to use with your Mac: the Magic Keyboard and the Magic Keyboard with Numeric Keypad. Despite their names, neither is particularly exciting. So you may want to set up a third-party keyboard to use instead.
Modern Macs support nearly all USB and Bluetooth devices. So any USB or Bluetooth keyboard should be compatible at least for basic features like typing standard keys. Special media keys may not work, but we’ll show you some apps you can use to fix them later.
Advanced features on more technical keyboards are also less likely to work with your Mac. That said, the situation is improving with popular manufacturers. For example, the Razer Synapse software that allows for macro recording on Razer keyboards is available for Mac these days.
For the most part, you can use any third-party keyboard you find around the house and there’s a good chance it’ll work with your Mac. If you’re planning to buy a new keyboard instead, take a look at the best alternatives to the Magic Keyboard for macOS-focused options.
Connecting a Third-Party Keyboard to Your Mac
To connect a USB keyboard, simply plug it in, and macOS will detect it. If it doesn’t work, visit the manufacturer’s website to check for any special drivers you need to install. Make sure you get the Mac driver and restart your computer after installing it.
For Bluetooth keyboards, navigate to System Preferences > Bluetooth on your Mac. Then turn on the keyboard and follow the manufacturer’s instructions to put it in discovery mode. Once it appears on your Mac, click the Pair button to connect it. Again, you may need to download special drivers from the manufacturer if it doesn’t work right away.
Customize Basic Keyboard Settings on Your Mac
You can customize your external keyboard and remap certain keys by going to System Preferences > Keyboard on your Mac. It’s especially important to do this if you’re using a Windows keyboard to make sure the keys behave how you want them to.
Click Change Keyboard Type to help your Mac detect what kind of keyboard you’re using: Razer, Steelseries, Logitech, and so on. Follow the keyboard wizard that appears, asking you to press various keys. Based on these results, you Mac will set up the default settings for your keyboard layout.
Click Modifier Keys to rearrange the keys that combine with others to perform certain actions. From left to right, the modifier keys on an Apple keyboard read Control, Option, Cmd whereas non-Apple keyboards usually read Control, Windows, Alt.
By default, macOS registers the Windows key as Cmd and the Alt key as Option. So you may want to remap the modifier keys for your external keyboard to match Apple’s keyboard layout and keep the order of these modifier keys the same. This is especially useful if you get confused switching between Apple and third-party keyboards.
Consider enabling the checkbox for Use F1, F2, etc. keys as standard function keys if you have a third-party keyboard that shares media keys with function keys.
Customize Your Keyboard Layout on a Mac
If you use a non-traditional keyboard layout, such as Dvorak or Colemak, or if you have a foreign language keyboard, then you can set that up in the Input Sources section. Click the plus Add (+) button to add as many layouts as you want. You can’t define your own layouts, but Apple provides many layouts across dozens of languages.
If you frequently switch between keyboard layouts, enable the Show Input menu in menu bar checkbox. This creates a menu bar icon that shows the layout you’re currently using. You can also click on it to quickly switch to other layouts you’ve set up.
