Six Bartender Alternatives to Manage Your Mac's Menu Bar

[JoelBC]

This week I payed the upgrade fee from Bartender 5 to 6.
It's interesting to note that macOS Tahoe has imposed a great challenge to the developer.
I'm using Bartender 6.1.3 both on macOS Sequoia 15.7.2 and macOS Tahoe 26.1 on two different M2 Pro Mac models and it works far better on macOS Sequoia.
On macOS Tahoe there are many display artifacts and some icons are repositioned without sense.
Also one icon from the visible group appears in the menu bar but not in the setup window within Bartender???
The previous post comments about the 6.2 Test build, but I'll hold until it's released.
As it is now, on macOS Tahoe Bartender 6 is work in progress, the worst working of all my add ons.

Appreciated.

Comments about Tahoe are interesting. Would be nice for teh developers to i) share this information and ii) respond to my e-mails!

Sadly agree that it is a work in progress noting my experience is similar to yours which is why I have given up!

 

[oric1]

Appreciated.

If you could test Barbee's automation features I would be most grateful noting that they did not work for me per my above post.

Not sure what's below is what you need, as I never used the Automation before, nor the Triggers in Bartender.

I tried the following: in the Hidden Items bar, there are 3 icons from ToothFairy (https://c-command.com/toothfairy/). ToothFairy helps controlling Bluetooth devices. One icon is related to a Bluetooth mouse, another one to a Bluetooth pair of speakers, and the last one to Bluetooth headphones. I selected the headphones icon and this is how it looks in Barbee preferences/Automation:

When I turned the headphones on, the icon showed up in the main Menu Bar to the leftmost position. It remained there for about 10 seconds, then disappeared. When I turned the headphones off, the icon showed up again, but this time the designed was hollow instead of white, indicating that the headphones were off. After a while that icon disappeared. The only issue is that as indicated in the Barbee preferences, the purple icon is persistent, although it is dark. It went away after turning the headphones off, but not immediately.

It seems to be working OK, but you'll be the judge. If you want to test Barbee, you can do so for 90 days with TestFlight.

Hope that helps.

 

[yayarod]

I had given up on Bartender, but yesterday I tried Bartender 6.2 Test Build. It is better than the 6.1.x versions, but there a still a couple of icons that cannot be properly handled by the indexing process. After every computer restart, they are moved by bartender where I do not want them. Barbee has no more issues with any items and works propoerly here. I'm wondering if they fixed their Automation feature.

I installed the Bartender 6.2 Test build and also can confirm that it performs better (much better in fact) than the 6.1.3 stable release on macOS Tahoe 26.1.

 

[JoelBC]

Not sure what's below is what you need, as I never used the Automation before, nor the Triggers in Bartender.

I tried the following: in the Hidden Items bar, there are 3 icons from ToothFairy (https://c-command.com/toothfairy/). ToothFairy helps controlling Bluetooth devices. One icon is related to a Bluetooth mouse, another one to a Bluetooth pair of speakers, and the last one to Bluetooth headphones. I selected the headphones icon and this is how it looks in Barbee preferences/Automation:

View attachment 2579335

When I turned the headphones on, the icon showed up in the main Menu Bar to the leftmost position. It remained there for about 10 seconds, then disappeared. When I turned the headphones off, the icon showed up again, but this time the designed was hollow instead of white, indicating that the headphones were off. After a while that icon disappeared. The only issue is that as indicated in the Barbee preferences, the purple icon is persistent, although it is dark. It went away after turning the headphones off, but not immediately.

It seems to be working OK, but you'll be the judge. If you want to test Barbee, you can do so for 90 days with TestFlight.

Hope that helps.

@oric1 , greatly appreciated.


One follow up, how do I go about trying it using TestFlight as my only experience with TestFlight in teh past was having beta software distributed automatically to me via developers?

 

[JoelBC]

I installed the Bartender 6.2 Test build and also can confirm that it performs better (much better in fact) than the 6.1.3 stable release on macOS Tahoe 26.1.

@yayarod , greatly appreciated as well.

Any insights or updates on the functionality of the Triggers?

 

[yayarod]

@yayarod , greatly appreciated as well.

Any insights or updates on the functionality of the Triggers?

@JoelBC , I don't use triggers.
Regarding alternatives, I also tried the macOS Tahoe version of Ice.
Deleted it after 10 minutes. It left a persistent Permission granting window after al Permissions were correctly set, that I couldn't make disappear and also crashed once.

 

[JoelBC]

@JoelBC , I don't use triggers.
Regarding alternatives, I also tried the macOS Tahoe version of Ice.
Deleted it after 10 minutes. It left a persistent Permission granting window after al Permissions were correctly set, that I couldn't make disappear and also crashed once.

Appreciated.

I will try Barbee again, perhaps they got it fixed.

Simply disillusions with Bartender for not responding to a single e-mail in 4 months!

 

[JoelBC]

I tried to install and test Barbee today but was locked out as I previously tested and have no more days left.

I would appreciate if someone could test a simple Barbee Automation for me. One example / possibility being to create an Automation which displays the hidden Focus menu bar icon when the Focus mode is DND.

If it works then the Focus menu bar icon should i) appear ii) not flutter and iii) sipper when the DND Focus mode is cancelled.

Much thanks in advance.

 

[JoelBC]

I bit the bullet and decided to revisit Barbee and note the following about Automations:

1. Automations more or less work.

2. The more or less is a result of the following:

a. General: I found that for next results I had to set an "Off" version for each automation to hide the icon once the state I wanted to be visible finished (i.e., I wanted the sound icon to appear when I had my AirPods but for best results I setup an non-AIrPods / off version when my AirPods were removed).


b. Backup applications: I use Arq, CCC and Time Machine. I have problem having these icons disappear when the backups are done. If anyone was able to get this work, please share.


c. Arq specific: The animated icon when a backup is active comes and goes a bit but is more or less visible.

All in all (and subject to the above), it seems to work and is certainly better than Bartender!

 

[JoelBC]

**ADDITIONAL UPDATE**

I was premature in my assessment of Barbee.

I have preformed further testing and have concluded that it is NOT useable.

I wrote the developer noting my e-mail reads as follows:


E-MAIL STARTS HERE

As a start, I am Bartender convert to Barbee and have purchased a license.

I am unfortunately experiencing problems with Barbee including:

1. Hidden icons appear as shown items for now reason. See the red box below where the weather and Wi-Fi icons i) appear as shown and ii) in the wrong order!
2. Hidden icons disappear (i.e., some of the icons that I have setup as hidden do not appear in the hidden portion of the menu bar).
3. Hidden icons do not maintain their order (i.e., the order of the hidden icons in Preferences / Menu Bar Layout is not the order that the hidden icons appear in the menu bar). See the red box below where “C” icon is in the wrong place.
4. The Automations do not work when trying to force the hidding of an icon. The following is an example for the Time Machine icon that simply does not work regardless of whether the Comparison Mode is Original or Template (i.e., the icon remains visible). This automation should hide the Time Machine but it does not.

All in all, there are too many bugs in the application to make it beneficial / worthwhile as demonstarted above.

Kindly let me know when these will are fixed as I would love to get these to work reliably!

E-MAIL ENDS HERE

 

[JoelBC]

Not sure what's below is what you need, as I never used the Automation before, nor the Triggers in Bartender.

I tried the following: in the Hidden Items bar, there are 3 icons from ToothFairy (https://c-command.com/toothfairy/). ToothFairy helps controlling Bluetooth devices. One icon is related to a Bluetooth mouse, another one to a Bluetooth pair of speakers, and the last one to Bluetooth headphones. I selected the headphones icon and this is how it looks in Barbee preferences/Automation:

View attachment 2579335

When I turned the headphones on, the icon showed up in the main Menu Bar to the leftmost position. It remained there for about 10 seconds, then disappeared. When I turned the headphones off, the icon showed up again, but this time the designed was hollow instead of white, indicating that the headphones were off. After a while that icon disappeared. The only issue is that as indicated in the Barbee preferences, the purple icon is persistent, although it is dark. It went away after turning the headphones off, but not immediately.

It seems to be working OK, but you'll be the judge. If you want to test Barbee, you can do so for 90 days with TestFlight.

Hope that helps.

I should add that I was able to get Focus Modes, Sound, and WiFi status related Autoations to work but the others were no goes!

 

[JoelBC]

** BARBEE UPDATE ***

I have been in contact with the Barbee developer and am happy to share that:

1. He has been very responsive and is working with me to get the bugs out.

2. The TestFlight version is fairly good but does have a few nits which he is working on. This includes the automations which pretty much work though there are a few remaining tweaks (i.e., icons do not always return to hidden but this can be addressed by adding another automation, hopefully this will no longer be needed when fixed).

In support of this I purchased the application (actually paid for it even though I have TestFlight access) and will not be returning to Bartender (who never answered my e-mails).

Very happy with the product (and will be thrilled when teh few nits are sorted out!)

Hope this is helpful to this group!!

 

[Tagbert]

** BARBEE UPDATE ***

I have been in contact with the Barbee developer and am happy to share that:

1. He has been very responsive and is working with me to get the bugs out.

2. The TestFlight version is fairly good but does have a few nits which he is working on. This includes the automations which pretty much work though there are a few remaining tweaks (i.e., icons do not always return to hidden but this can be addressed by adding another automation, hopefully this will no longer be needed when fixed).

In support of this I purchased the application (actually paid for it even though I have TestFlight access) and will not be returning to Bartender (who never answered my e-mails).

Very happy with the product (and will be thrilled when teh few nits are sorted out!)

Hope this is helpful to this group!!

How is the basic functionality of moving icons to a secondary view working on the current version? I have no need for automation but would like to get away from Bartender.

 

[JoelBC]

How is the basic functionality of moving icons to a secondary view working on the current version? I have no need for automation but would like to get away from Bartender.

If my a secondary view you mean below the menu bar then it is working. If you mean something else, please ask.

I think it important to note that it is still buggy but i) functional / tolerable and ii) teh developer is responsive so there is hope.

 

[JoelBC]

Here is a summary of the items I have found in Barbee that need to be addressed:

1. Automations
   1. Add the ability to reorder the automations, both automatically and manually
   2. Fix / remove the automation limit. This is what caused Barbee to freeze and lock up on multiple occasions.
   3. When using an automation to move a hidden icon to a visible icon (i.e., when a Time Machine backup is being performed):
      1. Time to trigger can b every long and, at times, not trigger.
      2. When the automation conditions are met, remove the icon form the hidden icon section (i.e., currently it displays as both hidden and visible as illustrated in Attachment 1.)
      3. When the automation conditions are no longer met, return the icon from the visible section to the hidden section (i.e., currently I need to create a separate automation to ensure / force this which is a problem per 1b above)
   4. Would you please clarify / explain:
      1. The purpose / use of the time
      2. The difference in comparison modes (i.e., Original vs Template) and in which instances / situations should I be using Original and Template.
2. Icon truncation
   1. Leftmost menu bar icon sometimes gets truncated on my Apple Studio Display (which is not notched) when “Enhanced Mode is only available for Notched screens” is enabled.
3. Live Activities
   1. Automations to move icons from hidden to visible and vice versa do not work when there is a Live Activity (i.e., icons tend to jump)
   2. Preferences cannot be accessed when there is a Live Activity,
4. Menu bar icons
   1. Icons that were in the menu bar have been removed when configuring / using Barbee. These have always been icons that appear in System Settings > Menu Bar > Menu Bar Controls / Allow In The Menu Bar. While fixable, the fix is not obvious.
5. Screen Recording:
   1. The screen recording icon is always visible. I don’t know whether Barbee is / is not always recording but as a user it is unsettling to for the screen recording icon to be ever-present

If anyone has answers, feel free to fire away!

 

[Tagbert]

If my a secondary view you mean below the menu bar then it is working. If you mean something else, please ask.

I think it important to note that it is still buggy but i) functional / tolerable and ii) teh developer is responsive so there is hope.

My main interest is in having more than one set of icons that can be toggled between, either on the main bar in a secondary bar. I recently switched from Bartender to Ice but it’s function to move icons seems to be broken right now.

 

[JoelBC]

@Tagbert , I have tried both Barbee and Bartender recently. I note that both are having problem moving icons at present particularly when there is a Live Activity (which I do use). I think -- from what I have read -- but am not certain that it has to do with a combination of macOS 26.x + Live Activities as it seems all such applications are having this problems. Whether it is fixable or not remains to be seen.

If interested, I started this thread to discuss some observations with respect to Bartender (note: I will add more overt weekend when time permits).

It is unfortunate that the ability to manage icons has been diminished as I find Barbee's Automations / Bartenders triggers very helpful as they provide a quick visual of what is taking place on my MAcBook (i.e., TimeMachine menu bar icon is hidden unless a backup is taking place in which case the menu bar icon is visible and I know not to disconnect my drive).