GIMP shortcuts for Mac

Essential GIMP shortcuts include R for Rectangle Select, E for Ellipse Select, and M to move objects. Use Shift+C for the Crop tool, N for the Pencil, and Shift+E for the Eraser. Press T for the Text tool and O for the Color Picker. Common editing shortcuts are Ctrl+Z to undo, Ctrl+D to duplicate, and Delete to clear a selection. Press 1 to reset zoom to 100% and F11 to toggle fullscreen.

Press R for Rectangle Select or E for Ellipse Select to start a selection. Use F for the Free Selection (lasso) tool to draw custom shapes. Toggle the active selection on or off with Ctrl+T, or press Shift+Q to enable Quick Mask mode for painting selections. To fill a selection, use Ctrl+Comma for foreground color or Ctrl+Period for background color. Clear the current selection by pressing Delete.

Navigate between layers using Page Up to move to the next layer and Page Down to go to the previous layer. Create a new layer with Ctrl+Shift+N, and merge all visible layers with Ctrl+M. To open an image as a new layer, press Ctrl+Alt+O. You can also duplicate the current layer by selecting it and pressing Shift+Ctrl+D. Toggle the Layers panel visibility with Ctrl+L if it's accidentally closed.

If GIMP shortcuts aren't working, the most common issue is context-sensitivity. Make sure the image window is focused and you're not typing in a text layer or dialog box. GIMP can have conflicts with duplicate or legacy shortcuts — go to Edit > Keyboard Shortcuts to review and reset bindings to defaults if needed. On Mac, check that macOS system shortcuts in System Settings > Keyboard aren't overriding GIMP shortcuts. Restarting GIMP usually resolves temporary shortcut issues.