Multi-desk setup
If you carry a MacBook between a home desk and an office desk, every plug-in means dragging windows back into place, because the two setups have different monitors, sizes and arrangements.
Short version: macOS does not save a window layout per monitor setup. SnapState does. Arrange each desk once, save it as a named workspace such as Home or Office, and arm it to restore when that display layout appears. Your apps, windows, Spaces and browser tabs come back on their own for $9.99 once.
When you unplug at one desk, macOS moves that display's windows onto the laptop screen so they stay reachable. When you plug into the other desk, the monitors have different resolutions, sizes and positions, so macOS places windows by its own rules rather than where you kept them at that desk. Docks, USB-C hubs and DisplayLink adapters can also make monitors appear in a different order. The result is a new mess every morning and every evening.
1. Set the arrangement once per desk in System Settings, Displays, Arrange. macOS remembers the arrangement and main display for each set of monitors it has seen. 2. With Displays have separate Spaces turned on in Desktop and Dock settings, right-click an app in the Dock, choose Options and assign it to the desktop on a specific display, so new windows from that app open there. 3. Use the Window menu, Move and Resize, or the green button menu to send a window to another display in apps that support it. These help, but they do not save positions and sizes, they do not reopen apps or tabs, and you repeat them at each desk. For a no-app routine, see save window positions on Mac without an app.
1. At home, arrange your apps and windows across the monitors and save a workspace named Home from the SnapState menu bar. 2. At the office, do the same and save Office. 3. Optionally save Laptop only for the train or the couch. 4. Arm Home and Office to restore when a matching display layout appears, and Laptop only to restore when a monitor disconnects. 5. Plug in. SnapState relaunches missing apps, remaps each window to its saved display, Space, position and size, and reopens the saved browser tabs. You can also restore any workspace from the menu bar or with Control-Command-1 to 6.
| Built-in macOS | SnapState | |
|---|---|---|
| Layout saved per monitor setup | Display arrangement only | Windows, sizes, Spaces and apps per named workspace |
| Restores on connect or wake | No | Yes, automatically |
| Relaunches apps | No | Yes |
| Browser tabs | Per-browser session restore | Safari, Chrome, Edge, Brave, Arc, Chromium |
| Price | Included | $9.99 once for up to 3 Macs |
The 40 second demo shows a workspace saved from the menu bar and restored with one click: apps relaunch and windows return to their displays, positions and sizes.
SnapState is not a tiling or snapping tool. It does not save tab groups, history or form data, Firefox is not supported, and it does not change the display arrangement, menu bar or Dock. It needs Accessibility permission, and Automation permission for browser tabs. Workspaces stay local on your Mac. For the one-desk version of this problem, see MacBook windows rearrange when you connect a dock and restore windows after unplugging a monitor. See SnapState.
Not reliably on its own. macOS remembers the display arrangement for a set of monitors and sometimes returns windows to a display it recognizes, but it has no saved window layouts per setup. SnapState saves one named workspace per setup and restores it on demand or automatically when a matching display layout appears.
When you undock at home, macOS moves windows onto the laptop screen. When you connect the office monitors, which have different sizes, resolutions and arrangement, macOS places windows on its own, so they rarely land where you had them last time at that desk.
Yes, by the displays. Each workspace stores the monitor and display layout it was saved with, and a workspace can be armed to restore when a matching display layout appears, when a monitor connects or disconnects, or on wake from sleep.
Yes. Restoring relaunches missing apps, returns windows to their displays, Spaces, positions and sizes, and reopens all open tabs of each saved window in Safari, Chrome, Edge, Brave, Arc and Chromium once Automation permission is granted. Firefox is not supported.
$9.99 once, for up to three Macs, with a 14-day refund. Version 2.7.5 needs macOS 15.7 or later and runs on macOS 26.