Setting environment variables globally on MacOS at login.

environment.plist

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<!DOCTYPE plist PUBLIC "-//Apple//DTD PLIST 1.0//EN" "http://www.apple.com/DTDs/PropertyList-1.0.dtd">
<plist version="1.0">
    <dict>
        <key>Label</key>
        <string>my.startup</string>
        <key>Program</key>
        <string>/Users/user/.config/login_setenv.sh</string>
        <key>RunAtLoad</key>
        <true/>
    </dict>
</plist>

login_setenv.sh

#!/bin/sh

launchctl setenv XDG_CONFIG_HOME $HOME/.config
launchctl setenv XDG_DATA_HOME $HOME/.local/share
launchctl setenv XDG_STATE_HOME $HOME/.local/state
launchctl setenv XDG_CACHE_HOME $HOME/.cache
launchctl setenv XDG_RUNTIME_DIR $TMPDIR

launchctl setenv ZDOTDIR $HOME/.config/zsh

launchctl setenv TERMINFO $HOME/.local/share/terminfo
launchctl setenv TERMINFO_DIRS $HOME/.local/share/terminfo:/usr/share/terminfo

launchctl setenv WAKATIME_HOME $HOME/.local/share/wakatime

Guide

1. Place environment.plist into the directory ~/Library/LaunchAgents
2. Place login_setenv.sh wherever you like.
3. Make the file executable: chmod +x login_setenv.sh
4. In the environment.plist file, replace /Users/user/.config/login_setenv.sh with the actual path to your login_setenv.sh file.
5. The script will be executed automatically on next login.

Useful commands

Note

501 is your current user ID (UID). You can get it with the command: id -u

• launchctl bootout gui/501/my.startup
  → Unloads / stops the service (removes it from running state)

• launchctl bootstrap gui/501 ~/Library/LaunchAgents/environment.plist
  → Registers / loads the plist into launchd (makes the service known to the system)

• launchctl kickstart gui/501/my.startup
  → Immediately starts the service (even if it has no KeepAlive / RunAtLoad)

• launchctl print gui/501/my.startup
  → Shows detailed status and properties of this particular service

• launchctl print gui/501
  → Shows all services and their state for current user domain

• launchctl list | grep -i my.startup
  → Shows whether the service is currently loaded and its PID (if running)

• launchctl getenv XDG_CONFIG_HOME
  → Shows the value of environment variable from launchd's perspective

• printenv | grep -i '^XDG_'
  → Shows all XDG_* variables visible in the current shell