Hi MPUers, is there a way to force hide menu bar icons (without Bartender)? There are apps which are showing an icon in the menu bar but are mostly background apps and don’t have a way to turn off the icon from their preferences. Any other way, to accomplish this?
PS: I tried CMD + dragging the icon away from the menu bar, but it doesn’t disappear like Apple’s standard menu bar icons.
I found this. Haven’t tried it.
I use Hidden Bar. It works nicely to hide app icons and works unobtrusively when you want/need to reveal those hidden icons. A < > icon appears to expand/collapse the hidden set.
[ always present icon set ] < [ Control Center Icon ] [ Date/Time/Notification Icon ]
[ hidden icon set ] [ always present icon set ] > [ Control Center Icon ] [ Date/Time/Notification Icon ]
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JJW
I use Dozer and prefer it to Hidden Bar:
@JohnAtl @DrJJWMac @ThatNerd Thanks for answering/suggestions.
I want to remove the icon from the menu bar, not hide it. I can hide icons using BetterTouchTool or other apps you shared. But there are way too many icons in the menu bar and when I expand/unhide them, they collide with the active app’s menu items. I know Bartender has the bartender bar which could solve it, but I don’t want to provide screen recording permissions to it.
Plus, I don’t think I ever access many of those menu bar icons (like Flux, I always open the UI via Alfred), so removing them would save space and show only icons that I actually use. I was able to remove a bunch of them via every app’s preferences, but some are persistent and don’t have an option in their preferences. I was wondering if there is a way like changing a macOS config/properties/plist file or doing something else that can force remove an app’s menu bar icon.
I don’t think there’s a hidden setting. I remember how much of a “mission impossible” removing Spotlight icon used to be a couple versions of macOS back. Design-wise Apple wants all menu bar items to be there all the time. System elements are an exception because they can be toggled in System Preferences.
I think it’s one of the cases where you can’t have a cake and eat it. It’s either the default macOS behaviour, one of the apps suggested by other people posting in the thread that is able to hide icons or Bartender.
I really think that, unless you have a very specific reason, you should reconsider Bartender though. It offers narrower spacing (which actually seems to be working without screen recording permission) and you can choose between hiding icons and removing them from the bar. The fact that it requires screen recording permissions is because it needs to monitor the menu bar are and react accordingly. It doesn’t mean it’s capturing the full screen the whole time and sending it somewhere. If it was, there would be an orange icon all the time (it’s pretty much impossible to remove it).
Some apps have an option in their settings to switch off the menu bar icon or application helper. Tools can only help hide icons, not switch them off.
If you have super secret spy stuff going on, Little Snitch might be the better option.
Then you could install Bartender and see that it’s not uploading your spy stuff anywhere.