How to make your Mac remember window positions
macOS forgets where your windows were in two situations: when an app quits, and when your displays change. One has a built-in fix. The other needs an app.
When an app quits and reopens
Most apps can reopen their windows exactly where you left them. macOS turns this off by default.
- Open System Settings › Desktop & Dock.
- Turn off Close windows when quitting an application.
Apps now reopen their windows in the same place. When you restart, keep Reopen windows when logging back in ticked in the restart dialog and the same happens for everything at once. This only holds while your displays are the same as when you quit.
When you plug in or unplug a monitor
This is the one macOS does not solve. When a display disconnects, its windows move to the screens that are left, and no setting puts them back when it reconnects. Why this happens.
| Option | What you do | What you get |
|---|---|---|
| Drag them back | Rearrange every window, every time | Free, and never ends |
| A window manager with saved layouts | Arrange windows, save a layout, update it when things change | Snapping and tiling as well — Moom or Snapback |
| An app that remembers each setup | Nothing, or a one-time save | Windows go back when you plug in — Resettle, Stay or Display Maid |
How these apps compare — price, setup and what each one handles.
What Resettle does
Resettle learns instead of asking you to save anything. Arrange your windows how you like and it remembers that arrangement for the display setup you are on. When that setup comes back, so do the windows.
- Tells identical monitors apart, and the same model at home and at work
- Puts full-screen windows back in full screen
- Can reopen apps a setup had open
- Leaves a window alone rather than guess which one it is
- $14.99 once — no subscription, no account
Questions
Why does my Mac forget window positions after a restart?
Close windows when quitting an application is on by default. Turn it off in System Settings › Desktop & Dock, and keep Reopen windows when logging back in ticked when you restart.
Why do windows open on the wrong monitor?
Apps reopen windows where they last were. If your monitors have changed since — a different desk, a different arrangement — macOS places them wherever it can. An app that remembers each setup puts them back on the right one.