MACSTORIES COLLECTIONS

Extending Shortcuts for Mac with Third-Party Apps

• John

Automation April has reacquainted me with the many bugs in Shortcuts for Mac. It’s incredibly frustrating to hit a wall when you have an idea for an automation that should work but doesn’t because of a bug. I have a long list of wishes for Shortcuts actions, but I’d take stability over any of them.

Shortcuts’ reliability is a bigger topic for another day, but one of the ways I cope with its issues is through third-party apps. That’s also how I extend Shortcuts’ functionality. A rich collection of new and existing automation apps have adopted Shortcuts, which has kept Shortcuts interesting on the Mac despite the overall lack of new features in macOS Ventura.