Ask: Fixing Bad Screen Resolution

If you've got an Apple, Mac, or iOS tech question, we've got the answer. In this week's Ask, we'll let you know how to restore your Mac monitor when the resolution gets thrown out of whack.

Question

Suddenly (possibly due to a small child) everything on my Mac is too big for the screen. I have to drag the mouse to the right-hand side of the screen to see the clock, etc. I’ve tried zooming out, and that doesn’t help. All of the text seems distorted. Can you help?

Answer

The wrong resolution could be set on your Mac for a few different reasons. The main reason is that the actual resolution of your Mac has changed. To check this, navigate to Apple menu > System Preferences > Displays, and check to make sure that the “Resolution” option is set to “Best for display.” 

Usually when the screen contents doesn’t fit to the display, and moving your mouse from side to side only scrolls the screen, then an accessibility setting has been changed. To check this, navigate to Apple menu > System Preferences > Accessibility > Zoom. Once here, ensure that the options for “Use keyboard shortcuts to zoom” is left unchecked, and also make sure that “Use scroll gesture with modifier keys to zoom” is left unchecked. Disabling these options will disable the Mac’s built-in accessibility scrolling. 

When certain accessibility settings are enabled, the screen will be zoomed in so that you can more easily see certain items up close. Disable these to prevent accidental zooming.

After disabling these features, your display should fix itself and you should no longer have this issue persist on your Mac, since we’ve disabled the options that could accidentally enable this feature in the future.

Ask is written by Cory Bohon, a freelance technology writer, indie Mac and iOS developer, and amateur photographer.

Got a tech question? Email ask@maclife.com.