Mac maximise full screen

Some Adobe apps support macOS full screen mode, some do not.

The list changes over time, because Adobe updates applications to work with macOS full screen mode.

After Effects does not, and it is not clear what priority this is on the list of things to fix or add.

Photoshop only made the switch a few months ago, 10 years after Apple introduced full screen mode and 34 years after Photoshop was first released. Premiere Pro made the switch recently too, so although it may take many years, it’s definitely possible to get an Adobe video product team to make the move…eventually. If you want macOS full screen mode in After Effects, check the After Effects Ideas page to see if it is already requested and just needs to be voted up. If it is not already there, you can start a request.

If you want the full history of why many Adobe apps do not support macOS Full Screen Mode, read on…

After Effects belongs to the era of late 20th century Adobe software that started on the Mac over 30 years ago, like Photoshop and Illustrator. At that time, Classic Mac OS did not have a full screen mode, and so like many Mac apps at the time, After Effects didn’t have it. Some individual apps created their own proprietary full screen mode, and Photoshop was one of those.

In 2014, 30 years after the first Mac, Apple added full screen mode to what was now called Mac OS X. Any Adobe apps developed before that time were not originally written to support Mac OS X full screen mode; After Effects is one of those apps. Adobe apps started after this point often did support Mac OS X full screen mode right from their 1.0 versions; I think Adobe Lightroom was one of those and it still supports Mac full screen today.

Until a few years ago, support for Mac full screen mode in Adobe apps looked like this (list is not complete).

No (green button maximizes):

Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign, Premiere Pro, After Effects, Media Encoder, Bridge, Acrobat, Creative Cloud desktop app…

Yes (green button enters Mac Full Screen mode):

Lightroom Classic, Lightroom…

In recent years, some Adobe product teams have retrofitted the old apps to work with full screen mode in what is now called macOS. Today, the list looks like this (again, not all apps are listed).

No (green button maximizes):

Illustrator, InDesign, After Effects, Media Encoder, Bridge, Creative Cloud desktop app…

Yes (green button enters macOS Full Screen mode):

Premiere Pro, Acrobat, Lightroom Classic, Lightroom, Photoshop (if you enable the option)…

Have you tried CMD+\

I think you can not do it. I've checked and none of the Adobe apps can run in full screen mode. Not sure if this is a limitation in the OS. Anyway, saying that is unusable is not true, even your OS Dock is using a lot more space than the thin program bar.. You can use it without any problem.

What you can do is to obtain a Full Screen Preview of your composition activating this option in the Preview Panel.