diff --git a/kitty/constants.py b/kitty/constants.py
index b68c6e068..0e9783b02 100644
--- a/kitty/constants.py
+++ b/kitty/constants.py
@@ -141,10 +141,12 @@ def cache_dir() -> str:
 def runtime_dir() -> str:
     if 'KITTY_RUNTIME_DIRECTORY' in os.environ:
         candidate = os.path.abspath(os.environ['KITTY_RUNTIME_DIRECTORY'])
+    elif is_macos:
+        candidate = os.path.join(cache_dir(), 'run')
     elif 'XDG_RUNTIME_DIR' in os.environ:
         candidate = os.path.abspath(os.environ['XDG_RUNTIME_DIR'])
     else:
-        candidate = os.path.join(cache_dir(), 'run')
+        candidate = os.environ.get('XDG_RUNTIME_DIR', os.path.join(cache_dir(), 'run'))
     os.makedirs(candidate, exist_ok=True)
     os.chmod(candidate, 0o700)
     return candidate
@@ -167,7 +169,9 @@ except KeyError:
     with suppress(Exception):
         print('Failed to read login shell via getpwuid() for current user, falling back to /bin/sh', file=sys.stderr)
     shell_path = '/bin/sh'
-ssh_control_master_template = 'ssh-kitten-{kitty_pid}-master-{ssh_placeholder}'
+# Keep this short as it is limited to 103 bytes on macOS
+# https://github.com/ansible/ansible/issues/11536#issuecomment-153030743
+ssh_control_master_template = 'kssh-{kitty_pid}-{ssh_placeholder}'
 
 
 def glfw_path(module: str) -> str: