ShrtcutmacOS has no built-in setting for binding an app to a keyboard shortcut. System Settings can rebind menu commands inside an app, but not launching one. To do it you need Spotlight, a Shortcuts-app workaround, Automator saved as a Quick Action, or a third-party launcher.
This surprises people, because macOS is otherwise generous about shortcuts. Keyboard settings will happily let you reassign any menu item in any app, including ones the developer never thought about. But that mechanism works on menus, and an app that is not running has no menus to bind.
So the question becomes which workaround to accept. There are four, and they differ less in whether they work than in what they cost you day to day.
1. Spotlight, which you already have
Press ⌘ Space, type enough of the name, press Return. For most people most of the time this is genuinely the right answer, and it is worth being honest about that before recommending anything else.
Its weakness is that it is a different action every time. The keystroke is fixed but the typing is not, and the number of characters you need changes as your Mac accumulates files that happen to match. Muscle memory never quite forms, because there is nothing stable to memorise.
2. The Shortcuts app, bound to a Quick Action
Create a shortcut containing a single Open App action, then in the shortcut’s details enable it as a Quick Action and assign a key. This is the closest thing to an official answer, and it needs nothing installed.
Two caveats. The first launch after login is often slow, because the Shortcuts runner has to start before your app does. And every app needs its own shortcut and its own key combination, which is where this approach quietly falls over — by the fifth app you are choosing between combinations you will not remember.
3. Automator, saved as a service
The older version of the same idea: an Automator Quick Action with a Launch Application step, then a key assigned under Keyboard settings. It works, it is stable, and it has the same one-key-per-app ceiling as the Shortcuts method with a clunkier editor.
Worth knowing if you are on an older macOS where Shortcuts is unavailable. Otherwise the newer route is the same work with less friction.
4. A launcher, which solves the ceiling
Every method above spends one key combination per app. That is the real constraint, and it is why people who try the Automator route usually stop at three or four apps.
A launcher inverts it: one shortcut opens a picker, and the picker holds as many apps as you like. Shrtcut does this with a ring that opens under your pointer — hold the key, aim, release. The keystroke is identical every time regardless of which app you want, so the thing you memorise is a direction rather than a combination.
That is the trade. You give up the purity of one dedicated key per app, and in return you stop running out of keys. If you only ever want to launch two applications, the Shortcuts method is less machinery for the same result and you should use it.
Which to pick
Fewer than three apps, and you want no new software: use the Shortcuts app. You will spend ten minutes and never think about it again.
More than three, or you find yourself forgetting which combination is which: that is the ceiling, and a launcher is the answer to it. The symptom to watch for is choosing a key you already know you will not remember.
Happy with typing a few letters each time: stay with Spotlight. It is already installed, already maintained, and there is no honest argument that a launcher beats it for someone who does not mind typing.
Frequently asked questions
Can macOS assign a keyboard shortcut to open an app?
Not directly. System Settings › Keyboard › Keyboard Shortcuts can rebind menu items within an app, but there is no setting for launching one. Opening an app by key requires the Shortcuts app, Automator, or third-party software.
Why is my Shortcuts-app shortcut slow the first time?
The Shortcuts runner has to launch before it can run your action, and after a reboot it is not yet in memory. Subsequent presses are much faster. If the first-launch delay bothers you, a launcher that is already running avoids it.
Do these methods need Accessibility permission?
The Shortcuts and Automator routes do not. Any tool that watches for a global key press before you have focused it does, because macOS treats reading keystrokes across apps as a privileged operation.
What happens if the app is already open?
All four methods bring the running app forward rather than starting a second copy. Whether they raise the window you actually want is a different question — on that, see our post on switching between windows of the same app.