I had an app-specific shortcut in System Settings to open the Tags dialog (CMD+;). Prior to Tahoe, Tags… was a top level menu item. Now it’s only a context menu item. Therefore, my app-specific shortcut won’t trigger. My poor fingers are very confused. I guess I will have to move the shortcut to Keyboard Maestro unless anyone out there can tell me I’m doing something wrong.
I don’t use many tags on Mac…waitingfor, actionrequired, deletein120days, deleteinayear, desktop. But I need the tags I need. Any ideas?
By tags dialog, do you mean what you see if you do right click → Tags…?
If so you can trigger the right click menu with Ctrl+Enter, so in Keyboard Maestro do a two step flow.
Type a Keystroke → Type Ctrl+Enter
Click at Found Image → Take a screenshot of where to press in the menu, insert it in the relevant box.
Then just choose the old keyboard shortcut for it. Not the smoothest macro of all time but at least its automated. Let me know if you meant something else.
I am SURE Keyboard Maestro (KM) can handle your problem. But I’m not sure that we understand exactly what you’re asking.
If you’re in Finder and select one or more files, just have KM click File → Tags for you. That will give you all your tags.
I’d go a step further and create a conflict palette. Have a keystroke trigger for your macro such as ⌃⌥T for tags. Then A for actionrequired, W for waitingfor, etc. You could use Y for deleteinayear and Q for deletein120days (quarter). etc.
There are lots of KM examples here and of course on the KM Discourse.
Lastly, @MacSparky’s Keyboard Maestro Field Guide is the best $50 you will ever spend.
In Tahoe, Tags… is a top level File menu item when one or more files are selected. If a folder is selected the menu item is Customize Folder… In Sequoia Tags… is always a top level File menu item.
However, in both OSes it doesn’t work (at least for me) to add a Keyboard App Shortcut for Finder to bind Tags… or File->Tags… to a key. So I don’t know how the OP was successful with Sequoia!
OK, I’ve found the problem. The File->Tags… menu item gets “special treatment” apparently in any macOS. To solve, go to Finder->Settings->Tags and remove all of the Favorites at the bottom of the pane. When this is done then File->Tags… behaves like a normal menu item and can be added to the Keyboard App Shortcut. The “price” of doing this is you no longer have any favorite tags and the tags menu disappears from the (right button) context menu!
Access to the “Files, Tags…” menu in Finder via Keyboard Maestro is not directly supported because Keyboard Maestro cannot natively trigger Finder’s built-in contextual or top-level menu items such as “Tags…”—these menus are controlled at the system level and are difficult to invoke programmatically with third-party automation tools. Macros targeting Finder selections or performing actions like tagging files usually require scripting (such as AppleScript or Automator), and even these approaches may not reliably open the “Tags…” panel itself due to macOS restrictions.
Why Finder Menus Are Hard to Access
• Keyboard Maestro Macros mostly interact with Finder selections and automate bulk actions, but system dialogs like “Tags…” are not exposed for automation in Keyboard Maestro’s standard actions.
• Context menu items (like “Tags…”) are not accessible via simple menu triggering, hot keys, or Keyboard Maestro’s built-in UI actions; this is a restriction by macOS for security and sandboxing reasons.
• Some users work around this by using AppleScript, Automator Quick Actions, or third-party utilities that offer deeper Finder integration, but these methods are limited and sometimes unreliable.
Workarounds and Alternatives
• Export Keyboard Maestro macros as Finder Quick Actions and trigger them from Finder’s contextual menu, but these typically act on file attributes—opening the tag dialog itself usually still requires manual intervention.
• Use AppleScript to apply tags programmatically rather than open the menu, or rely on third-party apps explicitly designed for tagging automation.
Keyboard Maestro excels at automating repetitive Finder tasks like renaming, moving, or tagging files, but initiating the specific “Files, Tags…” menu action directly is restricted by macOS’s system-level controls.
Thanks for figuring that out. I has verified that approach works and works without involving Keyboard Maestro. Now I have to ponder if that’s a better tradeoff than having Favorites. I think it may be because I always type the tag anyway and this keeps my hands on the keyboard.
Wonder who’s idea this was at Apple?
@nfdksdfkh has another approach that he demonstrated working above by having Keyboard Maestro force a mouse click in the appropriate spot. I will also give that a try so I could keep favorites.
I will surely forget this entire discussion and “favorite” a tag at some point
I already own Keyboard Maestro
You’ve revealed a new tool with the click on image action. My previous problem was that I didn’t narrow the search for the image to the frontmost window.
I’ve long had no favorite tags. Thus revealing the Finder’s “File → Tags…” menu item.
You can target that menu item with Keyboard Maestro, I routinely invoke that when I want to manage tags for an item. (I have lots of tags and the “favorites” or “sidebar” approaches were not good for me.)
Now though, I need to add a single favorite in order to access the “Customize folder…” option. And then take it away again to manage tags. Crazy.
Somewhere around here I have a shortcut to send feedback to Apple…
The whole new Customize Folder feature is a hack of Tags. I sent complaints about this to Apple back in the first beta, and only part of it was resolved. I used a tag, yellow, I named “sticky” for files and folders on my desktop that I didn’t want to be automatically cleared off (using Hazel). With Tahoe, the folders became yellow. Luckily they finally added a toggle in Finder Settings Tags to disable coloring of folders. But for people who want colored folders it still shows the little colored dot for the tag alongside the colored folder. Why?? And if you make an alias of a customized folder the alias isn’t customized, and cannot be customized.
