Open new Finder windows to Home, not Recents

Every time you press Cmd-N, a new Finder window opens to Recents — a scrolling jumble of every file you touched lately, from every corner of the disk. It's macOS's default, and it's rarely what you want. Point new windows at your Home folder instead and each one opens to the same stable hub: Desktop, Documents, Downloads, and the rest, right where you left them.

Change it in Finder Settings

1. Click any empty spot on the desktop, or click a Finder window, so Finder is the active app.
2. In the menu bar choose Finder → Settings (called Preferences on older systems), then open the General tab.
3. Open the New Finder windows show dropdown and pick your Home folder — it carries your account name and a small house icon.

That's the whole change. There's no Save button; close the window and press Cmd-N to test it. The setting behaves the same on macOS 13 Ventura, 14 Sonoma, and 15 Sequoia. Existing windows keep whatever folder they're showing — only newly opened ones follow the new target.

Why Home beats Recents

Recents isn't a real folder. It's a saved search that gathers files from everywhere you've been working — a downloaded PDF, a screenshot, a document from a network share — and lists them by date. That's useful for "what did I just have open," but useless as a starting point: you can't reliably drag things into it, the contents shuffle every few minutes, and it quietly surfaces files you might not want on screen when someone's looking over your shoulder.

Home is the opposite. It's the fixed root of your account, the folder every other personal folder lives inside. Opening there means every new window starts one click away from Documents, Downloads, Pictures, and any folders you've made yourself. It's the same view every time, which is exactly what a default should be.

Do it from the Terminal

If you'd rather script it — or set it up across several Macs — one command does the same job. PfHm is Finder's internal code for the Home folder.

# Point new Finder windows at your Home folder
defaults write com.apple.finder NewWindowTarget -string "PfHm"
killall Finder

# Undo — restore the default (Recents)
defaults delete com.apple.finder NewWindowTarget
killall Finder

The killall Finder line restarts Finder so the change takes effect immediately; your windows blink closed and reopen, and nothing is lost. Running the delete command wipes the custom value and returns you to stock behaviour.

Only new windows follow the change

This setting steers new windows, so anything already open keeps showing whatever folder it was on — close and reopen those, or press Cmd-N, to send them to Home. New Finder tabs obey the same target too: open one with Cmd-T and it lands in Home alongside your windows, which keeps a tab-heavy workflow consistent. Clicking the Finder icon in the Dock when nothing else is open also creates a fresh window that respects the target. If a window ever opens somewhere unexpected, it's usually a saved window restored from your previous session rather than a new one — macOS reopens those to their old location regardless of this setting. Start a genuinely new window and it will always honour your Home default.

One more path worth knowing: with Finder active you can also make a window from the menu bar via File → New Finder Window, and it obeys the same Home target as Cmd-N. However you spawn a window — shortcut, menu, or the Dock icon — the destination stays consistent, which is the whole reason to set a sensible default once and then stop thinking about it.

If you still want quick access to recent files

You don't have to lose Recents entirely — it lives in the Finder sidebar, one click away, even when new windows open to Home. If it's cluttered, clearing recent items on Mac resets the list without changing this setting.