Separate work and personal browsing on a Mac
by ZwayStudiosupdated
The simplest way to separate work and personal browsing on a Mac is to use two profiles in the same browser: one signed in to your work account, one to your personal account. The catch is that macOS shows both behind one Dock icon. Chrome Profile Switcher fixes that by giving each profile its own Dock icon, so switching is one click.
Why profiles are the right tool
There are a few ways to keep work and home apart on one Mac. Profiles win for most people.
Profiles vs two different browsers. Using Chrome for work and Safari for personal does split things, but you now maintain two sets of bookmarks, two password stores and two sets of habits. Some sites also behave differently between browsers. With two profiles you keep one browser you know, and each side still gets its own logins, history and extensions.
Profiles vs Incognito. A private window keeps nothing after you close it. That is useful for a quick check, but for daily personal use it means signing in to everything, every time, and losing your history. A personal profile remembers what you want it to remember, and only for that side.
Profiles vs two macOS user accounts. A second Mac user gives a full split, but you have to log out or fast switch users to move between them, your apps and files are split too, and you cannot have a work tab and a personal tab on screen at the same time. Profiles keep both a click apart on the same desktop.
The switching problem
Profiles solve the separation. They do not solve getting between them.
The macOS Dock shows one icon per running app. Every profile runs inside the same browser app, so all of your work and personal windows sit behind one Chrome icon. Clicking it brings forward whatever Chrome had in front last, which is often the wrong side.
Chrome’s own tools help only a little. The avatar button and the Profiles menu open a new window in the other profile rather than bringing back the one you had. ⌘` cycles through every window of the front app one at a time. If you have a few windows open on each side, you end up clicking and checking the avatar in the corner until the right one shows.
How the app fixes it
Chrome Profile Switcher is a small menu bar app for macOS 14 or later. It adds a separate icon to Apple’s own Dock for each profile that has an open window, showing that profile’s picture and a small browser badge. The icons sit next to Chrome’s normal icon.
- Click the work icon and your existing work windows come forward. If they are on another desktop or display, macOS switches there.
- Click again to move to the next work window.
- Hover to see that profile’s windows and jump to one. The optional live previews show pictures of each window.
- Right-click for New Window or New Incognito Window in that profile.
It does not make a copy of Chrome. One browser keeps running with the same logins and no second browser in memory, and each icon is a launcher of about 2 MB. The app asks for Accessibility on first launch, has no account and no analytics, and goes online only to check for updates.
A simple setup
- In Chrome, create a Work profile and a Personal profile, and sign in to the matching Google account in each.
- Give each a clear picture or colour so the two Dock icons look different.
- Download Chrome Profile Switcher, open it, and grant Accessibility.
- Right-click each new icon and choose Options, Keep in Dock if you want them there all the time.
If links from Mail or Slack keep landing in the wrong profile, read why Chrome opens the wrong profile on a Mac. If you also have client accounts, see the page for agencies and freelancers.
Other browsers
The same setup works in Brave, Microsoft Edge, Vivaldi and Chromium, and in Firefox, Zen, LibreWolf and Waterfox. Opera, Opera GX, Arc and Dia are matched only when they have a single profile for now. See the browsers overview for details.