How to prevent open last projects when IntelliJ IDEA starts?

Question

By default IntelliJ IDEA opens the last project when starting.

How to start IntelliJ without opening last project?

Answer 1

If for any reason you need to change this setting without using the UI (for example if IDEA is hanging when it opens your project), you can find the setting in eg

/.IntelliJIdea10/config/options/ide.general.xml

The location of the file is documented in http://devnet.jetbrains.net/docs/DOC-181

The specific setting you need to change (or add) is

Mac

In the latest version of IntelliJ, the location of this file on a Mac is

~/Library/Preferences/IntelliJIdea2018.2/options/ide.general.xml

Settings Repository

If you have the settings repository enabled, then it can be found here:

~/.IntelliJIdea${idea_version}/config/settingsRepository/repository/ide.general.xml