How to Install a .saver File on Mac

· Scanner Techs

You downloaded a screensaver and ended up with a file whose name ends in .saver. It is not an app, so there is nothing to drag to Applications, and nothing obvious happens when you look at it. Here is what it is and where it goes.

What a .saver file is

A .saver is a bundle: a folder that macOS shows as a single file, holding a plug-in that the screensaver system loads when the screen goes idle. That is why it does not behave like an app. It has no Dock icon and no window of its own. It is a piece macOS picks up and runs, which is also why it has to sit in a particular place.

There are two such places:

  • ~/Library/Screen Savers — just for you.
  • /Library/Screen Savers — for everyone who uses the Mac. Needs an administrator password.

Note the space in “Screen Savers”. Both folders may be missing on a Mac that has never had a third-party screensaver; that is normal, and you can create them.

The quick way: double-click it

Double-click the .saver file. macOS takes that as a request to install it and opens Screen Saver settings. Some versions ask first whether to install it for you alone or for everyone on the Mac; if yours does, installing it for yourself is the one that needs no password.

That is the whole job when it works. When it does not, the file goes in by hand.

The reliable way: put it in the folder

  1. In Finder, press Shift-Command-G to open Go to Folder.
  2. Type ~/Library/Screen Savers and press Return. If Finder says the folder does not exist, go to ~/Library instead and make a new folder called Screen Savers, spelled exactly like that.
  3. Drag the .saver file into it. Leave it loose in the folder, not inside another folder.
  4. Open System Settings → Screen Saver and look for it.

Your ~/Library folder is hidden in Finder by default. Go to Folder reaches it anyway, or you can hold Option while opening Finder’s Go menu, which makes Library appear in the list.

For all users, do the same with /Library/Screen Savers — no tilde — and authenticate when macOS asks.

Why it is not showing up in System Settings

macOS does not mix third-party screensavers in with Apple’s. They are collected under a heading called Others, usually at the bottom of the list, and sometimes behind a Show All button you have to press first. Most “it did not install” reports end here.

If it is genuinely absent, work through these.

Check the path. ~/Library/Screen Savers, not ~/Screen Savers and not ~/Library/Screensavers. A typo in the folder name means macOS never looks there.

Check it is not nested. Unzipping sometimes leaves the .saver inside a folder named after the download. Move the .saver itself up one level.

Restart System Settings. Quit it completely with Command-Q and open it again. The list is read when the pane loads.

Consider the age of the saver. Apple has changed how screensavers load more than once over the years, and a very old .saver may not load on a current Mac at all. If it is years old and nothing else helps, that is the likely answer.

Look for a security warning. This is the common one, and it has its own section.

The Gatekeeper step

macOS checks downloaded code before it runs it. Apple’s notarisation service is what clears it, and a .saver that is unsigned, or signed by a developer but not notarised, gets stopped the first time macOS tries to load it.

On macOS 15 and later, the dialog you get offers only Done and Move to Bin. There is no Open button in it, and no Control-click trick. The way through is in System Settings:

  1. Dismiss the dialog with Done. Do not move it to the bin.
  2. Open System Settings → Privacy & Security and scroll down to Security.
  3. There is a line naming the blocked item with an Open Anyway button beside it. Press it and authenticate.
  4. Go back to Screen Saver and select the screensaver again.

That button only appears for about an hour after the block. If it has gone, trigger the warning again — select the screensaver, or double-click the file — and the line comes back.

One useful detail: the warning comes from the quarantine flag your browser attaches to downloads, not from the file itself. A file fetched with curl in Terminal is not quarantined, which is why a Terminal install can be quiet when a browser download is not. That is the reason Nap’s install page offers both: the one-line command goes through without a prompt, and the disk image needs Open Anyway once.

Removing a screensaver

  1. In System Settings, choose a different screensaver first, so macOS is not using the one you are about to delete.
  2. Go back to ~/Library/Screen Savers and move the .saver to the bin. For /Library/Screen Savers you will need to authenticate.
  3. If it still appears in the list, quit System Settings and open it again.

Screensavers that install themselves

Not every screensaver asks you to do this. Some ship as a normal app that puts its own files in place, which avoids the folder, the typos and most of the Gatekeeper confusion. Nap works that way: you open the app, press Install, and it writes its screensavers into the right folder for you, then offers a button that opens Screen Saver settings. Changing the look happens in Nap itself, where there is a live preview of the styles and backgrounds, rather than in System Settings.

If you are reading this because a flip clock would not load, Nap’s Flip Clock is one that installs itself and runs for two days before it asks for anything. If a .saver still refuses to appear after all of the above, support is a good place to describe what you are seeing.

All posts · Nap is our own collection of screensavers for the Mac. Install it and the first two days are free.