How you create a shortcut to MATLAB depends on your operating system. Regardless of operating system you will need to know where MATLAB is located before you can create a shortcut. See “How do I launch MATLAB?“ for help finding MATLAB.
Windows
You can create a shortcut to the desktop or you can add MATLAB to your Start Menu.
- To create a shortcut, right-click on matlab.exe and select “Send to >” and then select “Desktop (create shortcut)”.
- To add MATLAB to the Start Menu, right-click on matlab.exe and select “Pin to start.”
macOS
You can add MATLAB to your Dock or you can create an alias.
- To add MATLAB to your Dock, simply drag the application onto the Dock and wait until the other icons make room for the MATLAB icon. Then release the MATLAB icon.
- To create an alias, right-click or control-click MATLAB in your application folder and select “Make Alias.” The alias will be created in the same folder MATLAB is in, so you need to move it to where you want it to be.
Linux
You can create a symbolic link for MATLAB in /usr/local/bin/ so you can run MATLAB from anywhere. To do so, create the link with the ln -s command. For example, if you are using R2022b and it is installed in the default installation directory, run this command:
ln -s /usr/local/MATLAB/R2022b/bin/matlab /usr/local/sbin/matlab
This will allow you to run MATLAB from anywhere on your system without needing to first navigate to the MATLAB installation directory.
If you are on a Linux distribution that can use Desktop shortcuts, then please consult your distribution's instructions for creating a shortcut.
