See dotfiles like .zshrc and .gitignore in Finder

Your .zshrc, .gitignore, and .gitconfig sit right in your home or project folder — but open Finder and they're gone. Any filename that begins with a dot is treated as hidden on macOS, a Unix convention Finder honours by default. To edit them from Finder, flip hidden files on: press Cmd+Shift+. for a quick look, or set a permanent preference for daily work.

The one-shot toggle

When you just need to grab a dotfile for a minute, the keyboard shortcut is the fastest route and leaves nothing to undo later.

• Open the folder in Finder — your Home folder for .zshrc and .gitconfig, or a repo folder for .gitignore.
• Press Cmd+Shift+. (Command-Shift-Period). Every dot-prefixed file appears, dimmed to mark it as hidden.
• Double-click the file to open it, or drag it onto your editor. Press Cmd+Shift+. again to tuck them away.

The toggle is per-Finder and flips the same underlying setting the Terminal command below controls — the shortcut just does it without typing.

Keep dotfiles visible for good

If you edit shell and git config often, showing dotfiles all the time saves the repeated shortcut. One Terminal command sets it:

# Show hidden files, including all dotfiles
defaults write com.apple.finder AppleShowAllFiles -bool true
killall Finder

killall Finder restarts Finder so the change lands right away. Want the clean view back? Write the opposite value:

# Hide dotfiles again
defaults write com.apple.finder AppleShowAllFiles -bool false
killall Finder

Both the shortcut and this command behave identically across macOS 13 Ventura, 14 Sonoma, and 15 Sequoia.

Open a single dotfile without unhiding everything

Often you don't want a Finder full of dimmed system files — you just want to open this one dotfile. Finder's Go to Folder box takes you straight to it by name.

1. With Finder active, press Cmd+Shift+G.
2. Type the path, for example ~/.zshrc or ~/.gitconfig, and press Return.
3. Finder reveals and selects that file even while hidden files are otherwise off — double-click to open it.

For a dotfile inside a project, the same trick works with a full path like ~/Projects/site/.gitignore. And if you live in Terminal, open ~/.zshrc or open -e ~/.gitignore opens it in your default editor or TextEdit without touching Finder at all.

A note on editing config files safely

Dotfiles are plain text, but they're loaded by tools that can be fussy about syntax. If you open .zshrc in TextEdit, switch it to plain-text mode first (Format → Make Plain Text) so it doesn't save smart quotes or rich formatting that your shell can't read. A dedicated code editor avoids that trap entirely and shows the leading dot in its file list, hidden or not.

While you're editing .zshrc

Now that you can see it, it's worth making your shell config work harder. Our guide to customizing your .zshrc on Mac covers aliases, a better prompt, and PATH tweaks that pay off every time you open Terminal.