Viewing CHM files under Mac OS X
December 21, 2007 by David Xie
Most of the eBooks nowadays are in either PDF or CHM format. While Windows have native support for CHMs (of course…), Macs have native support for PDFs. If you want to read PDF files under Windows, all you have to do is to install Acrobat Reader, but what if you want to read CHM files under Mac OS X? Since a number of eBooks that I’ve got are in CHM format, I was conformed with the task of finding a CHM reader for my Mac. So I did a little research online and found an application called xchm. Its a really basic application for reading CHM files, but it also have some really handy functions too. I will demonstrate the app using the help file from my Comodo Firewall Pro.
Before you install the reader, you probably wouldn’t get the icon preview of your CHM files; after you’ve installed xchm, your CHM files should look something like this:
Here is a screen shot of the application. As you can see, the interface is pretty clean 
At the top left, you have a few options like changing the fonts of your CHM file (really useful if the default font is a bit too small for you), navigation, printing etc.
At the bottom left, you have a bookmarking system which allows you to add / remove bookmarks so you know where you were last time.
Surprising enough, this simple app didn’t forget about keyboard shortcuts! Command + S / P / T / Q are the ones that I frequently use.
The printing option is really handy if you like the speech service in Leopard (there is a new voice in Leopard called Alex). If you are lazy like me, you can always ask your Mac to read your books to you 
Alex (the new voice in Leopard) sounds pretty good to me So how are we gonna let our Mac to read the books to us?
Step 1. Go to File and then click on Print page or press the keyboard shortcut for print (command + p)
Step 2. Click on the Preview button:
Step 3. After a few seconds, preview should be opened with your page (in PDF):
Step 4. Now you can take advantage of the speech service and ask your Mac to tell you a bed time story
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Download xCHM 1.13:
omg i loooove ebooks! i know what pdf is, but what’s chm??!! anyways.
most of the things you say sound/look like 天書 to me. so i’ll just stop here. lol
bernie actor
I Googled for something completely different, but found your page…and have to say thanks. nice read.
Hi there!
I`m new in this mac stuff world, i just have a question, did you install this xchm using a distro package or source code? The source code option sounds quite complicated. Thanks!
Re Alex:
Hi there, hows it going? All you have to do is to download the “.dmg” file from the website, drag it to the “Applications” folder…and you can start using it right away
xCHM 1.13 for Mac: http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=87007&package_id=171033&release_id=500319
Hi David,
Thanks a lot for your efforts and time. I downloaded xchm through the link you provided for Alex and others. It works perfectly. Once again, many thanks!!!
Hi Absar
Thanks for your comments, I am glad my article helped you
Well, I tried xCHM and Chmox, and Chmox has a much better rendering.
Just try to open the same book on both, and it will shows.
http://chmox.sourceforge.net/
Re faz: thanks, I will give Chmox a try
Yes but CHmox hasn’t got a bookmarks facility
this is T H E BEST CHM reader for the Mac (MBPro…OS X)!!!
cool app !
xie xie
I have Chmox, and it doesn’t support printing, which blows!
If you have a 500 page book and want to pdf and or print you have to do it page by page!
Might as well just buy the paperback, and save time and money :-S
Going to give this a whirl and see how it goes… wish me luck!
Yeah so no luck with the print feature with xchom either!
I prefer the smoother look and feel or Chmox so I am reverting
Thanks for the effort and good hint though!!!