14

I bring my MacBook Pro back and forth between home and work. I have a Magic Mouse in both places. I guess because they are both the same model, I have to re-pair the mouse with the computer every time I go back and forth. They have very similar names so I'd like to rename them something like "Work mouse" and "House mouse". So far I haven't found a way. Is it possible?

Improve this question

5 Answers 5

Reset to default
13

You can do so in System Preferences. Open the Bluetooth panel, select your Magic Mouse and click the cog wheel at the bottom to select "Rename" from the context menu.

This option will only be available if the mouse is not plugged in.

enter image description here

Improve this answer
2
  • Thanks. Because of your answer I also discovered the "Add to Favorites" option. Hopefully that will make it so that I don't have to manually re-pair my mice each time I get to work or get home.
    – SSteve
    May 22, 2013 at 18:18
  • 3
    After the Sierra update, this no longer works. See the other answer for the new solution (right click etc)
    – Joshua Dance
    Dec 8, 2016 at 17:56
18

With the new update, you may not find the cog wheel, so instead you can go into bluetooth settings and right-click (click with two fingers) the device you wish to rename.

Screenshot

It should come up with a context menu.

Screenshot

Select Rename, which will open a window where you can rename your mouse to anything you like.

Screenshot

Improve this answer
3
  • This is the new correct answer.
    – Joshua Dance
    Dec 8, 2016 at 17:56
  • on Sierra I had to hold "Control" to show the menu, 2 finger click didn't work
    – Alvin
    Dec 14, 2017 at 23:46
  • 1
    on Sierra - same as Alvin.
    – Kevin Buchs
    Jan 12, 2018 at 15:10
4

In addition to other answers that indicate to use a secondary click on the device shown in the Bluetooth menu, also note that this is not possible while the device is connected with the cable.

I obtained a new Magic Mouse and connected it using the cable to my computer running macOS 10.14.3. The device was recognized and a system dialog informed me that "$PreviousOwner's mouse" had been connected to my system over Bluetooth and was ready to use. Naturally I wished to rename it, but the contextual menu only contained the option "Remove". There was neither "Rename" nor "Disconnect".

After having removed the cable and reopened the Bluetooth menu, the contextual menu showed the two options that were previously missing, and I was able to proceed with the rename without further problems.

I later reconnected the cable and noted that the two options again disappeared.

Improve this answer
1
  • 1
    This answer really helped me. I tried charging my Magic Trackpad 2 with a cable plugged directly onto my MacBookPro, and was unable to start the renaming process. Upon reading what you wrote, disconnected the cable, and Rename appeared, and was able to Rename. Thanks, Law29!!
    – esaruoho
    Nov 17, 2019 at 9:42
1

I was having the same issue and noticed that the context menu was different when rename would fail:

enter image description here

I was able to get the full menu (with "Disconnect") and successfully rename the device by not using it while attempting to rename (I was using CTRL-Command to bring up the context menu).

Improve this answer
1

For macOS High Sierra 10.13.6 (17G65), to rename, go to System Preference → Bluetooth → Control + click to open rename option.(for other macs use a double click on the object you want to rename then click rename, for others, use this technique: click on the item click the log, then rename.

Improve this answer

You must log in to answer this question.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged .