Where apps hide your files

Finding screen saver files on macOS

Updated 2026-10-28 · 5 min read

Screen savers on a Mac are spread over five places: two Screen Savers folders you can write to, two Apple system folders and an Aerial video store. Here is which is which, and how to remove one you installed.

Where the files are

~/Library/Screen Savers/
/Library/Screen Savers/
/System/Library/Screen Savers/
/System/Library/ExtensionKit/Extensions/
/Library/Application Support/com.apple.idleassetsd/

A .saver file you downloaded and double-clicked went into one of the first two: ~/Library/Screen Savers if you installed it for yourself, /Library/Screen Savers if you installed it for every user. On the Mac checked for this post (macOS Sequoia 15.6) both folders exist and are empty, which is normal until you install something. The other three belong to Apple.

~/Library is hidden in Finder. Press ⇧⌘G (Go > Go to Folder) and paste the path, or run open ~/Library/Screen\ Savers in Terminal.

What each folder holds

Location	What is in it
~/Library/Screen Savers	Third-party .saver bundles you installed for yourself
/Library/Screen Savers	Third-party .saver bundles installed for every account
/System/Library/Screen Savers	Only Random.saver, FloatingMessage.saver and a Default Collections folder of 12 colour images on Sequoia 15.6
/System/Library/ExtensionKit/Extensions	Apple's other savers as .appex extensions: Flurry.appex, Arabesque.appex, Shell.appex, Drift.appex, Hello.appex, Monterey.appex, Ventura.appex, Album Artwork.appex and Word of the Day.appex
/Library/Application Support/com.apple.idleassetsd	The Aerial videos in a Customer folder, plus their database, Aerial.sqlite

So if you go looking for Flurry in a Screen Savers folder on a recent Mac, it is not there: it is an extension now, mixed in with dozens of unrelated ones.

A .saver is a bundle, so Finder shows it as a single file. Control-click it and choose Show Package Contents to look inside, but there is nothing there to edit.

Installing and removing one

Double-click a .saver file and macOS says the screen saver must be installed before you can use it, offering Install for this user only or Install for all users of this computer. That choice decides which Screen Savers folder it lands in. If the same saver is already installed, macOS offers to replace it; Apple's own savers cannot be replaced.

There are two ways to remove one:

• In System Settings: open Screen Saver, Control-click the saver you installed and choose Delete. macOS warns that it will be moved to the Trash. (This command is part of the Screen Saver pane on Sequoia 15.6; it is for savers you added, not Apple's.)
• In Finder: quit System Settings, open the right Screen Savers folder, move the .saver to the Trash, then reopen the Screen Saver pane.

Neither needs Terminal. The copies in /System/Library cannot be removed or changed: that volume is sealed and protected by System Integrity Protection. If a built-in saver misbehaves, pick a different one.

Aerials and disk space

The moving landscapes and cityscapes are not in any Screen Savers folder. They download on demand into /Library/Application Support/com.apple.idleassetsd/Customer/, in folders named by quality such as 4KSDR, 4KHDR, 2KSDR and 2KHDR. On this Mac, which has not downloaded any, the Customer folder is about 5 MB of catalogue files with every quality folder empty, and the whole store is 14 MB. A Mac that has fetched several Aerials holds far more. Check yours with this read-only command:

du -sh /Library/Application\ Support/com.apple.idleassetsd

Apple does not document a way to delete Aerials in this folder by hand, the files belong to the system, and macOS may simply download a video again when it is next shown. The Wallpaper pane on Sequoia does include a Remove Download command for downloaded wallpapers, so Control-click a downloaded Aerial in System Settings > Wallpaper and see whether it is offered before you do anything else. That command could not be tried here, because nothing had been downloaded.

The same saver listed twice

Installing a saver again with the other choice (for you instead of for everyone, or the reverse) can leave one copy in each Screen Savers folder. If the pane lists a saver twice, or an old version keeps loading after an update, look in both folders, keep the newest copy and trash the other.

Which saver is active

Your idle time and current module are kept per Mac, in ~/Library/Preferences/ByHost/, in a file named com.apple.screensaver. followed by the Mac's hardware UUID. On the Mac checked it contains idleTime and moduleDict entries. Choose the saver in System Settings > Screen Saver and the delay with Start Screen Saver when inactive in System Settings > Lock Screen, never by editing the file. If a saver you removed is still selected, choosing another in the pane rewrites it.

Backing up or moving your savers

Third-party savers are usually small, a few megabytes at most. To keep them for a new Mac, copy the .saver files out of your Screen Savers folder to a drive or cloud folder, then double-click each one on the new Mac to install it. The active saver and idle time are settings, so you choose them again. Time Machine backs up ~/Library/Screen Savers with the rest of your home folder.

Older savers on newer macOS

Third-party .saver bundles do not run inside System Settings. They load through a separate host, legacyScreenSaver.appex, in /System/Library/Frameworks/ScreenSaver.framework/PlugIns/. On the Apple silicon Mac checked here, that host is built for both Apple silicon and Intel, and next to it sits legacyScreenSaver-x86_64.appex, an Intel-only build. As the name suggests, that second host is presumably what runs savers built only for Intel through Rosetta.

Savers that were never updated for recent macOS releases can show a blank screen, crash the host or fail to appear. If that happens, remove the .saver and look for a current build from its developer. Tahoe 26 may behave differently from the Sequoia results above, so check the Screen Saver pane after you install.

Finding them again later

Spotlight does not list anything inside ~/Library or inside bundles, and it tucks system folders away as system files, so a saver you installed last year will not show up by name. Everywhere indexes all five locations above, the Apple ones in /System/Library and /Library included, without any extra permission, so typing .saver lists every saver bundle in one go, Flurry finds Apple's extension and idleassetsd jumps to the Aerial store. ⌘↵ reveals a result in Finder, and the path tells you at once whether a saver is yours to remove or one of Apple's.

Common questions

Where do I put a .saver file on a Mac?

Double-click it and choose to install for this user only or for all users. That places it in ~/Library/Screen Savers or /Library/Screen Savers. You can also copy it into either folder yourself.

How do I uninstall a screen saver on a Mac?

In System Settings > Screen Saver, Control-click a saver you installed and choose Delete, which moves it to the Trash. Or quit System Settings and trash the .saver from ~/Library/Screen Savers or /Library/Screen Savers. Apple's built-in savers cannot be removed.

Where are the Aerial screen saver videos stored?

Under /Library/Application Support/com.apple.idleassetsd/Customer/, in quality-named subfolders. They only appear there after macOS downloads them.

Where is the Flurry screen saver on a Mac?

On macOS Sequoia it is an extension, /System/Library/ExtensionKit/Extensions/Flurry.appex, not a .saver file. It is part of the protected system volume, so it cannot be moved or removed.