Fish Shell on macOS - Complete Setup Guide

macOS ships with Zsh as the default shell (Apple switched from Bash back in 2019). Fish isn’t included, but it’s a single Homebrew command away. I run Fish on both my Mac and Linux machines, and the experience is nearly identical on both — which is one of the things I like about it.

This guide covers the full macOS setup: installation, making Fish your default shell, terminal emulator configuration, and the essential tools I install alongside it.

Install Fish with Homebrew

If you don’t have Homebrew yet:

/bin/bash -c "$(curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Homebrew/install/HEAD/install.sh)"

Install Fish:

brew install fish

Check the version:

fish --version

You should see fish, version 4.5.0 or newer. Homebrew keeps Fish up to date — run brew upgrade fish periodically.

Try Fish without switching

Type fish in your current terminal to start a Fish session. Play around with autosuggestions (just start typing and watch the gray suggestions appear), tab completion, and syntax highlighting. Type exit to go back to Zsh.

Set Fish as your default shell

macOS requires the shell to be listed in /etc/shells before you can set it as default. Homebrew installs Fish to /opt/homebrew/bin/fish (Apple Silicon) or /usr/local/bin/fish (Intel).

# Find your Fish path
which fish

# Add it to allowed shells
echo (which fish) | sudo tee -a /etc/shells

# Set as default
chsh -s (which fish)

Open a new terminal window. You should be in Fish.

To switch back to Zsh later: chsh -s /bin/zsh.

Terminal emulator setup

Fish works in any terminal, but your font matters. Fish’s completion pager and many prompt themes use special characters that need a Nerd Font.

Install a Nerd Font

brew install font-meslo-lg-nerd-font

Then set it as your terminal’s font. Here’s how for the popular options:

font-family = MesloLGS Nerd Font
font-size = 14

[font]
size = 14

[font.normal]
family = "MesloLGS Nerd Font"

config.font = wezterm.font("MesloLGS Nerd Font")
config.font_size = 14.0

Basic Fish configuration

Create your config file:

mkdir -p ~/.config/fish
nano ~/.config/fish/config.fish

A practical starting config for macOS:

# ~/.config/fish/config.fish

# Homebrew (Apple Silicon)
fish_add_path /opt/homebrew/bin
fish_add_path /opt/homebrew/sbin

# Common paths
fish_add_path ~/bin
fish_add_path ~/.local/bin

# Suppress the greeting
set -g fish_greeting

# Editor
set -gx EDITOR "code --wait"  # or vim, nvim, etc.

# Homebrew completions
if test -d (brew --prefix)"/share/fish/completions"
    set -p fish_complete_path (brew --prefix)/share/fish/completions
end
if test -d (brew --prefix)"/share/fish/vendor_completions.d"
    set -p fish_complete_path (brew --prefix)/share/fish/vendor_completions.d
end

The Homebrew completions block is important — without it, you miss tab completions for Homebrew-installed commands.

Install essential tools

Here’s my standard set of companion tools for Fish on macOS:

brew install fisher      # plugin manager (or install via curl)
brew install starship    # cross-shell prompt
brew install zoxide      # smarter cd
brew install eza         # modern ls replacement
brew install fzf         # fuzzy finder
brew install bat         # better cat with syntax highlighting
brew install fd          # better find
brew install ripgrep     # better grep

Set up Fisher

If you installed Fisher via Homebrew, it’s ready. Otherwise:

curl -sL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/jorgebucaran/fisher/main/functions/fisher.fish | source && fisher install jorgebucaran/fisher

Install Fish plugins

fisher install PatrickF1/fzf.fish     # fuzzy search integration
fisher install jorgebucaran/autopair.fish  # auto-close brackets
fisher install meaningful-ooo/sponge  # remove failed commands from history

See my best Fish Shell plugins guide for the full list.

Set up Starship (or Tide)

For Starship, add to config.fish:

starship init fish | source

For Tide instead:

fisher install IlanCosman/tide@v6
tide configure

I compared these and other prompts in Fish Shell themes — best prompts. I also have a dedicated Starship + Fish guide.

Set up zoxide

Add to config.fish:

zoxide init fish | source

Now use z instead of cd: z projects jumps to your projects directory. Full guide in my zoxide article.

Set up eza aliases

# ~/.config/fish/conf.d/eza.fish
abbr -a ls eza
abbr -a ll "eza -la --icons --git"
abbr -a lt "eza -la --icons --tree --level=2"

macOS-specific abbreviations

# ~/.config/fish/conf.d/macos.fish

# Quick Look from terminal
abbr -a ql "qlmanage -p"

# Open current directory in Finder
abbr -a finder "open ."

# Flush DNS
abbr -a flushdns "sudo dscacheutil -flushcache; sudo killall -HUP mDNSResponder"

# Show/hide hidden files in Finder
abbr -a showhidden "defaults write com.apple.finder AppleShowAllFiles -bool true && killall Finder"
abbr -a hidehidden "defaults write com.apple.finder AppleShowAllFiles -bool false && killall Finder"

I cover abbreviations vs aliases in detail in Fish Shell abbreviations vs aliases.

Node.js version management

The Bash-based nvm doesn’t work in Fish. Use nvm.fish instead:

fisher install jorgebucaran/nvm.fish
nvm install lts
set --universal nvm_default_version lts

Full walkthrough in my NVM with Fish Shell guide.

Common macOS issues

fish_add_path /opt/homebrew/bin
fish_add_path /opt/homebrew/sbin

set -gx JAVA_HOME (/usr/libexec/java_home)
set -gx ANDROID_HOME ~/Library/Android/sdk
fish_add_path $ANDROID_HOME/platform-tools

# ~/.config/fish/conf.d/ssh.fish
if status is-interactive
    ssh-add --apple-use-keychain ~/.ssh/id_ed25519 2>/dev/null
end

Related guides

• Fish Shell vs Bash vs Zsh — comparison of all three shells
• Fish Shell vs Zsh — since you’re probably switching from Zsh on Mac
• Install Fish on Ubuntu — if you also use Linux
• Fish Shell history guide — manage and search your command history
• Starship and Ghostty setup — modern terminal + prompt combo
• Ghostty Terminal guide — full Ghostty setup for Mac