How to automatically log out of your Mac when you’re inactive

If you share your Mac with others in your home and you’re going to take a break, you might log out. This helps to prevent someone from accidentally changing or deleting things you’re working on. But if you don’t plan to be gone long or simply forget to log out, you could risk losing important files.

To avoid this, we’ll show you how to set your Mac to automatically log you out if you’re inactive for a period of time.

Open the System Preferences using the icon in your Dock or Apple icon > System Preferencesfrom the menu bar. Then, follow these steps.

1) Select Security & Privacy.

2) Click the padlock on the bottom left and enter your password.

3) Hit the Advanced button. You can do this from any of the tabs within Security & Privacy.

4) Check the box for Log out after [X] minutes of inactivity and enter the number of minutesin the box.

5) Click OK and then click the padlock to re-lock your settings or simply exit.