How to rename files in bulk on a Mac

Finder has been able to rename a whole batch of files at once for years, and most people never find the button. It sits in the same right-click menu as Get Info, does not need Terminal, and handles the two jobs that come up most: stripping a messy prefix off a folder of exports, and turning a pile of numbered scans into something with an actual name in it.

Below is the exact procedure, what each of the three modes does, and where Finder's tool stops, which is sooner than you would expect.

How do you select and rename multiple files at once?

The rename option only appears once more than one file is selected, so start there.

1. Select the files you want to rename. Drag a selection box around them, or hold Command and click each one, or hold Shift to select a continuous range.
2. Right-click (or Control-click) the selection and choose Rename from the shortcut menu. It is also available from the Actions menu (the gear icon) in the Finder toolbar.
3. Choose a mode from the pop-up menu at the top of the panel: Replace Text, Add Text, or Format.
4. Fill in the fields for whichever mode you picked, and check the live preview beneath them before you commit to anything.
5. Click Rename to apply the change to every selected file.

Apple documents all three modes on its own support site, in its guide to renaming files, folders and disks on Mac.

What do Replace Text, Add Text and Format actually do?

The three modes cover different jobs, and picking the wrong one is the most common way this goes badly.

Replace Text works like find and replace. Type the text you want gone into the Find field and what should take its place into Replace With. Leave Replace With empty and it deletes the matched text instead. This is the right choice for stripping a repeated prefix, such as turning IMG_0142.jpg into Trip_0142.jpg across an entire folder in one pass.

Add Text inserts a fixed string before or after every current filename, without touching anything already there. Useful for tagging a batch as belonging to a client or a date, without renaming the files from scratch.

Format replaces the whole name with a pattern: a name you type once, followed by a number or a date. Finder offers three variants once Format is selected: Name and Index gives each file a plain running number (Design 1, Design 2), Name and Counter pads that number with leading zeros (Design 00001) so the files still sort correctly once you pass file nine, and Name and Date stamps the current date onto each name instead of a number. A Where menu lets you put the number or date before or after the name, and a starting value field controls what the count begins at.

What can Automator do that Finder's Rename cannot?

Finder's three modes cover most everyday renaming, but they cannot change the case of a name, strip a fixed number of characters from the front or back, or combine several rules into one pass. For that, macOS ships a second built-in tool: Automator's Rename Finder Items action.

1. Open Automator from Applications, and create a new Quick Action (so it appears as a right-click option afterwards) or a standalone Application.
2. Search the actions library for Rename Finder Items and drag it into the workflow area.
3. Choose a mode from its pop-up menu: Replace Text, Add Date or Time, Make Sequential, Change Case, Add Text, or Single Name. Change Case is the one Finder's own Rename does not offer at all.
4. Stack a second Rename Finder Items action underneath the first if you need two rules applied in order, such as changing case and then adding a date.
5. Save the workflow, then select files in Finder and run it, either from the Quick Actions submenu or by dropping files onto the saved Application.

It takes longer to set up than Finder's own panel, and it is worth it exactly once, the first time a rename job needs something Finder cannot do. For a one-off batch, Finder's Rename is faster.

Before you rename a large batch, one honest warning

Batch rename in either tool is not easily undone as a batch. Undo (Command-Z) reverses it immediately after, in the same Finder session, but once you have navigated away, closed the window, or run a second rename on top of it, there is no built-in way to reverse hundreds of files back to their original names in one step. Finder does not keep a rename history the way it keeps a Trash.

Why a good filename scheme still runs out

A rename pattern only works for as long as you remember what it means. Trip_0142.jpg is clear the week you named it. It says nothing eighteen months later, when you are looking for one specific photo among four hundred that all share the same prefix and a number that no longer means anything to you. The scheme was never wrong. It was just a description written by you, for you, at a moment you cannot get back.

That is the actual ceiling on any naming system, however well designed: it is still words standing in for a picture, and past a few hundred files, words stop being enough to tell them apart. A folder full of well-named files still shows you a list. Muse is a native Mac app that keeps the same files but shows them as a grid you recognise on sight, and reads the text and colours inside each one so you can find something by what it actually looks like rather than by the name you gave it. It cannot replace a well-run rename job. It replaces the need for one.