6 ways to customize your Mac’s Menu Bar, and another to make it disappear

The Mac's menu bar, a staple since 1981, remains largely unchanged despite a significant update ten years later. While Apple hasn't revolutionized its design, you can personalize its appearance and functionality.

Rearrange Menu Bar Icons: Easily reorder most menu bar icons by holding down the Command key and dragging them. Note: the Control Center, Siri, and clock icons remain fixed.

Customize System Icons:

Manage the visibility of system icons (Siri, Wi-Fi, battery) within System Settings > Control Center. Here, you can also customize the clock display, adding date, day, seconds, or even switching to an analog clock face. Application icons, however, are not customizable in this section.

Eliminate Menu Bar Transparency:

To remove the default transparency, go to System Settings > Accessibility > Display and enable Reduce Transparency. This results in a solid white (light mode) or black (dark mode) menu bar. You can also adjust the menu bar text size by selecting Large under Menu bar size.

Hidden Bar: Free App for Icon Management:

macOS lacks a native way to hide menu bar icons like Windows. Hidden Bar, a free App Store app, provides this functionality. Drag icons left while holding Command to hide them; a right-pointing arrow reveals hidden icons.

Bartender: Advanced Menu Bar Customization ($16):

While Hidden Bar suffices for many, Bartender offers more advanced features. Beyond hiding icons (via dragging left with Command), it allows conditional icon display (e.g., showing the battery icon only when unplugged).

Bartender also lets you modify the menu bar's appearance, adding color tints, borders, drop shadows, or rounded corners.

Completely Hide the Menu Bar:

For maximum screen real estate, System Settings > Control Center allows you to set the menu bar to Automatically hide and show the menu bar > Always. It will only appear when your cursor reaches the top of the screen.

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