How to type Chinese on MacOS - El Capitan, Sierra, Mojave, OSX

Go to System Preferences... Choose Keyboard Choose Input Sources, then click + Select Chinese (Simplified) - Pinyin - Simplified then click Add Make sure Show Input menu in menu bar is checked. Use the language icon in menubar to switch modes.

Typing in Chinese using Pinyin

Type in Pinyin, and select the character.

Additional Tips

It is a good idea to create a keyboard shortcut to switch between input modes. Control + Space is a popular choice.

Go to System Preferences... Keyboard Shortcuts Input Sources

Check Select the previous input source and set the shortcut to ^Space

What native Chinese people actually do:

Most people who live in mainland China install a 3rd-party input method. Sogou Pinyin Input is very popular.

The Sogou input method has advantages:

• It is partially cloud based, and will add new words as they become common in Chinese.
• It learns from what you type. For instance, if your home address uses a rare Chinese character, it will learn this and make it a top suggestion, rather than requiring you to frequently scroll through lists of characters.
• It has other advanced features.

The downside is the software must monitor all keystrokes to function, so you need administrator privileges to install it.