Shortcut Keys Issue in Final Cut Pro

The shortcut key feature in Final Cut Pro keeps getting deactivated on its own, very random, sometimes it's active with no problem and all of a sodden gets deactivated by itself and non of the shortcut keys work.

It's super annoying and frankly, the whole program is useless for me without the shortcut keys!

I've searched online numerous times with no luck.

It's so irritating that sometimes it makes me want to totally switch back to Windows and ADOBE Premier!


Can someone please help if there's a solution?


I'm running it on a MacBook Pro M1.


Thanks.

MacBook Pro 13″, macOS 14.5

Posted on Mar 19, 2025 9:23 PM

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Mar 20, 2025 1:25 AM in response to Final-Cut-Pro-Issues

Whenever the application misbehaves, the first thing to do is to delete its preferences. To delete preferences, hold down command and option while starting the application and click Delete Custom Settings. The application will start with default settings and open an “Untitled” library. Adjust the settings, reopen the library you were working, and see how it works now.

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Mar 20, 2025 11:35 AM in response to terryb

terryb wrote:

In addition to Luis and LocaAlicia's suggestions, I recall someone here (BenB?) saying that System shortcuts can override FCP shortcuts. Maybe it was the Accessibility shortcuts? I can't find that post but maybe he'll chime in.

This could explain some shortcuts not working, but if I understood correctly, the OP says that at times all the shortcuts cease to work. I would be very upset if it happened to me, that is for sure.


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Mar 20, 2025 11:36 AM in response to Final-Cut-Pro-Issues

If deleting the preferences does not fix things: Please run Etrecheck and post its full report here. Use the "additional text" button and paste the report into the text box.

There could be other software impinging on FCP, and the report may give us some clues.

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Mar 21, 2025 2:21 AM in response to Final-Cut-Pro-Issues

Final-Cut-Pro-Issues wrote:

Thanks for the tip but I don't think this works for me, I'm using some custom settings that don't want to loos and have to go set up every time.


A few things:


1) When you do delete the preferences, a file called VideoDiagnostics.... or similar (with a timestamp in its name), is created on your Desktop. Inside you will find copies of destinations, workspaces, etc.

You can restore these to their locations and not lose most of these settings.


2) Workspaces and Command Sets are saved in ~/Library/Application Support/Final Cut Pro

You can make copies of them somewhere for safekeeping (though at least Command Sets are not deleted when deleting preferences, as far as I can tell).


3) There are so many issues that are fixed by deleting preferences, as we have seen here time and again. We can't guarantee that this will fix your problem, but I still think it's worth a try.

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Shortcut Keys Issue in Final Cut Pro

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