How to Open the Terminal on a Mac or on Windows

The terminal is a plain window where you type commands to your computer instead of clicking. Every AI assistant on this site starts there. You do not need to know any commands yet: you only open the window, paste one line and press Enter.

On a Mac

1. Press the Command key and the Space bar at the same time. A search box (Spotlight) opens in the middle of the screen.
2. Type Terminal.
3. Press Return. The Terminal app opens.

No keyboard? Click the magnifying glass in the menu bar at the top right of the screen, type Terminal, then click Terminal. You can also open the Applications folder in Finder, then the Utilities folder, and double-click Terminal.

On Windows

1. Press the Windows key on your keyboard, or click Start on the taskbar.
2. Type Terminal. On older Windows 10 computers, type Windows PowerShell instead.
3. Click Terminal (or Windows PowerShell) in the results, or press Enter.

The window that opens runs PowerShell. That is the right place: the Windows install commands on this site are written for PowerShell. You do not need Run as administrator.

How you know it worked

It worked if you see a new window with a short line of text and a blinking cursor at the end. That line is the prompt: the computer waits for you to type. On a Mac it often ends with % or $. On Windows it starts with PS and ends with >.

On Windows, check that the line starts with PS. A line such as C:\Users\YourName> without PS means the window runs CMD, an older Windows terminal. CMD needs different install commands, so open PowerShell instead.

Paste and run a command

1. Copy the command from the guide.
2. Click inside the terminal window.
3. Paste with Command + V on a Mac, or with Ctrl + V or a right-click on Windows. Nothing runs yet.
4. Press Return or Enter to run it.
5. Wait until the prompt comes back before you type the next command. Some commands show no progress for a while.

You cannot click on text in the terminal to move the cursor. Use the arrow keys.

Stop a command

Press Ctrl + C (the Control key and C, also on a Mac). Most commands stop at once and the prompt comes back.

Close the terminal

Type exit and press Return or Enter, or close the window. If a program still runs in the window, stop it with Ctrl + C first.

If it did not work

• Spotlight shows nothing on a Mac: open Finder, choose Go in the menu bar, then Utilities, and double-click Terminal.
• Windows finds no Terminal: type PowerShell instead. Every current Windows version has Windows PowerShell.
• Paste does nothing on Windows: right-click inside the window. In many terminal windows a right-click pastes.
• You closed the window by mistake: nothing is lost. Open it again the same way.
• The terminal says a command is "not found" or "not recognized": the program is not installed yet, or the window was open before you installed it. Open a new window and try again.

When the window is open, go back to the assistant you chose and paste its install command.