Table of contents: 1. How to create a new user in Mac OS 2. How to delete a user in Mac OS
How to create a new user in Mac OS
Important note: Only a computer administrator can create a new user on Mac OS. Without an administrator’s password, the following steps will fail.
To create a new user on a MacBook, iMac or another computer with Mac OS, you need to go to “System Preferences”. You can get there by clicking on the apple icon in the upper left corner, and then select the corresponding item in the drop-down menu.
Once in the settings, go to the “Users and Groups” section, which contains information about all users of a particular computer.
To make changes to this section, unlock it. To do this you need to click on the icon with the lock at the lower left corner of the window.
You are going to see the notification saying that the “System Preferences” program wants to remove protection from the “Users and Groups” settings. To perform this action, you must enter administrator’s password and then click “Unlock”.
This will cause the actions in this section to be unlocked. Now you can create a new user. To do this, click on the plus sign in the lower left corner of the left column.
In the pop-up window you need to choose which account you are creating: administrator, standard, managed by parental control or having only shared access. Next, enter your account name and password. When all the necessary information is filled, click “Create user”.
Important note: It is not possible to create an account without a password.
After that, the user will be created. Even after creating a user, the computer administrator can make changes to his profile:
- To change password of the new user’s account you need to click on the “Reset password” item, where you can immediately enter a new password if you perform these actions under the administrator’s account.
- To change a user’s name or information about his system folders, right-click on his name in the list of users, and then select “Advanced options” from the drop-down menu. You are going to see a window with detailed information about the user, where you can change his name and other data.
- To designate a user as an administrator, after he has already created a standard account, select him in the list of users and click on the “Allow user to administer this computer” item. After restarting the computer, the user will become a full-fledged administrator.
How to delete a user in Mac OS
If the user created earlier is no longer needed, you can delete his account. Rights to this action are held by the administrator. To delete a user in Mac OS, go to the system preferences by selecting this item in the drop-down menu after clicking on the apple icon in the upper left corner.
Once in the settings, go to the “Users and Groups” section.
Here you need to unlock access to making changes. To do this, in the lower left corner click on the lock icon, then enter the password for the administrator account to remove protection.
Next, select the user you want to delete and click on the minus icon at the bottom of the list of users.
You are going to see an informational message where you can choose how to delete the user. It is possible to completely erase his data, as well as delete only the user but save his folder – either in the disk image or in the folder of all users. Select the desired option and click “Delete User”.
After that, the user will be immediately deleted.