Best Menu Bar Apps for Mac (2026): Picks by Job

The best menu bar apps for Mac each handle one small job you'd otherwise open a full app for. Our picks are Maccy for clipboard history, Tot for scratch notes, Be Focused for a Pomodoro timer and Stretchly for break reminders. Some of these live almost entirely in the menu bar. Others are regular apps that also add a menu bar icon. For each pick, we say which kind it is and what you can do from the icon.

Quick picks (as of November 2026):

• Maccy: best for clipboard history you open from the menu bar or with a hotkey.
• Tot: best for a tiny scratchpad with seven fixed pages that syncs to iPhone.
• Be Focused: best for starting, pausing and skipping a Pomodoro timer from the menu bar.
• Stretchly: best free break reminder that stays in the menu bar.
• Gubb: best if you'd rather have notes, clipboard history, timers and break reminders in one window that you show and hide from the menu bar.

We make Gubb, so weigh our view accordingly. We've tried to describe every app here by what it does and what it lacks, including our own.

How we chose these menu bar apps for Mac

Every app below does one recurring job, and the menu bar is a sensible place to reach it from. We looked at:

• What you can do from the icon. Some icons give you the tool's controls directly. Others only show or hide a window.
• Where the app lives. Some apps stay in the menu bar. Others also have a Dock icon and a regular window.
• Keyboard access. A global hotkey matters for things you reach for many times a day, like clipboard history.
• Price model. One-time purchase, subscription or free, as of November 2026.
• Limits that matter for the job. For example, how many notes you get, what kinds of clipboard items are saved, and whether breaks can be skipped.

The apps are grouped by job, so jump to the section for the job you have.

Best menu bar apps for Mac at a glance

What macOS already gives you

Check the built-in options before you install anything.

• System controls as menu bar icons. macOS can show some controls, such as Sound or Battery, as their own menu bar icons. Open System Settings and search for "Control Center" or "Menu Bar" to choose what appears.
• Rearranging icons. Hold Command (⌘) and drag an icon left or right to move it. You can also ⌘-drag most system icons out of the menu bar to remove them. To remove a third-party icon, use the app's own setting or quit the app.
• Timers. The Clock app (macOS 13 Ventura and later) has timers, but it opens as a window, not from the menu bar. See how to set a timer on Mac for the built-in routes.
• Notes. Stickies comes with every Mac and saves automatically, but its notes are only visible while Stickies is open, and it has no menu bar icon.

If these cover what you need, you don't need a menu bar app. The apps below are for when they don't.

Clipboard history in the menu bar

Maccy

Maccy is a small, open-source clipboard manager. It keeps a history of what you copy and lets you search it and paste from it. You open it from its menu bar icon or with a global hotkey; Softpedia lists ⌘⇧C (Command-Shift-C) as the default.

Good at:

• Keyboard-driven clipboard history with search. Its App Store tagline is "Clipboard manager. No fluff."
• Shortcuts actions for automation, according to its App Store listing.
• Open source under the MIT license.

Lacks:

• Anything beyond the clipboard: no notes, to-dos, timers or voice features.
• Versions for other platforms. It's Mac only.

Price (as of November 2026): $9.99 one-time on the Mac App Store, which the listing says supports development. The code is on GitHub, so you can build it yourself for free.

Watch out for: Maccy's GitHub README warns about fake websites pretending to be Maccy. Get it from maccy.app or the Mac App Store.

Pick it if you want small, focused clipboard history behind a menu bar icon and a hotkey. If you'd rather call up history from a launcher, Raycast's free plan keeps 3 months of clipboard history, and Alfred adds clipboard history with its paid Powerpack (£34 or £59, one-time, as of November 2026). Our clipboard manager roundup compares these in more depth.

On macOS 26 Tahoe, Spotlight also keeps a clipboard history. On Sonoma and Sequoia, the system clipboard holds only the last thing you copied. Our guide to seeing clipboard history on Mac covers both.

Quick notes in the menu bar

Tot

Tot, from The Iconfactory, is a "tiny text companion": a menu bar scratchpad with exactly seven pages for short bits of text. Tot 2 added adaptive Dock icons, so it can show in the Dock as well.

Good at:

• Quick, short-lived notes. Seven fixed pages stop it from turning into a second notes archive.
• iCloud sync between Mac and iPhone or iPad (Tot Pocket), plus a watchOS version (Tot Mini).
• Rich or plain text, automatic conversion of text to Markdown, and word and character counts as you type.

Lacks:

• More than seven pages. That limit is intentional.
• Windows or web versions.
• Support for anything older than macOS 14.

Price (as of November 2026): free to download. On the Mac App Store, premium features are a $19.99 in-app purchase. The iOS version lists its own $19.99 purchase, so you pay separately on each platform. We saw no subscription.

Pick it if you want a menu bar notepad that syncs to your phone and seven pages are enough. If you need more room or don't want sync, see our Tot alternatives. Gubb, covered below, is another quick-capture option you can bring up from the menu bar.

Timers in the menu bar

Be Focused

Be Focused is a Pomodoro timer for work and study. Its menu bar icon does real work: right-click it to start, pause or skip a session.

Good at:

• Controlling the timer from the menu bar, plus global hotkeys to start or stop it from any app.
• Blocking distracting apps and websites during work sessions, with a whitelist.
• Desktop and Notification Center widgets, Shortcuts support, and sync across iPhone, iPad and Mac.
• A ticking sound, a choice of alarm sounds and interactive notifications.

Lacks:

• An ad-free free version. Removing banners and ads is a paid in-app purchase.
• Windows support.
• Task management. That comes through the developer's separate Focus Matrix app.

Price (as of November 2026): the free Be Focused has in-app purchases, and subscription options were added in version 2.4. Be Focused Pro is a one-time Mac App Store purchase. US listings have shown both $11.99 and $19.99, so check the Be Focused Pro listing before you buy. The Pro Mac listing requires macOS 12 or later.

Pick it if you run Pomodoro sessions all day and want to control them from the menu bar. For more options, see best Pomodoro timer for Mac. Pomodoro basics are in how many pomodoros a day.

Break reminders and keyboard sounds

Stretchly (break reminders)

Stretchly is a free, open-source break reminder. It stays in the menu bar and only shows a reminder window from time to time, with an idea for what to do during the break.

Good at:

• Both short breaks and longer breaks.
• An advanced option that makes breaks behave like regular windows (title bar, not always on top, can be minimized) if full-screen interruptions bother you.
• Runs on macOS, Windows, Linux and FreeBSD, so you can use the same tool on every computer.

Lacks:

• Anything beyond breaks: no notes, clipboard or timer tools.
• Some options for everyone. "Contributor Preferences" (such as showing the time during breaks or hiding the tray icon) and preference sync are only for people who contribute code, translations or money.

It's built on Electron rather than as a Mac-only app.

Price (as of November 2026): free. Get it from Stretchly's site.

Pick it if you want free break reminders that work the same on Mac and Windows. Our break reminder apps for Mac page compares it with other options. For background on the habit, see what is a micro break.

Klack (keyboard sounds)

Klack is a menu bar app that plays mechanical keyboard sounds as you type. A review describes it as written in Swift and focused only on keyboard sound effects.

Good at:

• Six keyswitch sounds to choose from.
• Separate key-down and key-up sounds, with random pitch changes so typing doesn't sound like a loop.
• A shortcut to toggle it on and off: ⌃⌘K (Control-Command-K).
• 9to5Mac reports that Klack does not collect user data.

Lacks:

• Anything beyond keyboard sounds.
• Imported or custom sound packs. None of the sources we have mention them.

Price (as of November 2026): a review from about 10 months ago gave the Mac App Store price as $5. We couldn't confirm the current price, so check the App Store.

Pick it if you want typing sounds you can switch from the menu bar. For free and other options, see Klack alternatives or how to add mechanical keyboard sounds on Mac.

Gubb: one window behind a menu bar icon

Gubb is not a menu-bar-only app. It's a regular app with a Dock icon and one main window, and it also puts its full-color icon in the menu bar so you can bring that window back quickly. The window holds notes with Markdown-style shortcuts, checklists, clipboard history, a timer, and settings for break reminders and keyboard sounds.

What the icon does

• Left-click shows or hides the Gubb window.
• Right-click opens a menu with Show Gubb, Enter License Key... (direct-download version only) and Quit Gubb.
• Show Gubb is listed with ⌘⇧G, but that isn't a global shortcut. Gubb has no global hotkeys, so the menu bar icon or the Dock icon is how you bring it forward from another app.

To keep the window above everything else, hover the right edge of the note and click Pin window on top. Gubb remembers this between launches. A full-screen break reminder turns the pin off, so you may need to pin the window again afterwards.

To keep Gubb running in the background, hide it with a left-click on the menu bar icon rather than the red close button. Closing the window may quit the app, which also stops clipboard capture and break reminders.

How it compares with the single-job apps above

• Clipboard. History lives in a panel inside the window (right edge ▸ Clipboard History), not behind the menu bar icon. It captures text only (no images or files), and it starts recording only after you first open the panel in a session. It keeps up to 1,000 unpinned items plus any you pin. It doesn't filter passwords, so anything you copy as text is stored. To reuse an item in another app, click Copy to clipboard, then paste. If you want history you can open from the menu bar or with a hotkey, Maccy fits better.
• Notes. You can type straight away, and notes save automatically to a local database. Typing -, # or [ ] at the start of a line, then Space, creates a list, heading or checklist. gubb@todo or gubb@board on a line of its own turns a note into a to-do list or a Kanban board. There is no sync, so unlike Tot, nothing reaches your iPhone.
• Timers. The Timer dialog does countdown, stopwatch and Pomodoro, and can shrink to a floating pill. There is no countdown in the menu bar, and Pomodoro mode doesn't cycle work and break periods automatically. If you want timer controls in the menu bar, Be Focused has them.
• Breaks. Break reminders are off by default. Open Settings (the gear on the right edge) ▸ Break Time, turn on Enable Break Timer, then click Save Break Settings. At break time the Gubb window goes full screen with +1 Minute and Skip Break buttons. Breaks run only while Gubb is open.
• Keyboard sounds. Twelve system-wide sound packs, which need Input Monitoring permission. The on/off setting, pack and volume reset every time Gubb launches.

Price (as of November 2026): $59 one-time for a lifetime license (up to 3 devices), from the pricing page. The direct download includes a 7-day free trial with no account. Gubb is also on the Mac App Store as a separate version without the trial.

Pick it if you're juggling several small tools and would rather have one window for notes, clipboard history, timers and breaks, paid for once. If you only need one of those jobs done from the menu bar, a single-job app above will do it in fewer clicks. You can try Gubb free for 7 days.

How to choose

• You copy and paste all day: Maccy, opened with its hotkey.
• You need a scratchpad that also shows up on your iPhone: Tot.
• You work in Pomodoro sessions and want to control them from the menu bar: Be Focused.
• You keep forgetting to look away from the screen and don't want to pay: Stretchly.
• You like the sound of a mechanical keyboard on a laptop: Klack.
• You'd rather replace several of these with one window and one purchase: Gubb, accepting that it's a window app with a menu bar shortcut, not a set of menu bar tools.

For a broader list that isn't limited to the menu bar, see best productivity apps for Mac.

FAQ

How do I move or remove menu bar icons on a Mac?

Hold Command (⌘) and drag an icon left or right to move it. Command-drag most system icons out of the menu bar to remove them. For third-party icons, use the app's own setting or quit the app.

Why are some of my menu bar icons missing?

When the menu bar runs out of space, macOS hides the icons that don't fit. This happens most on MacBooks with a camera notch. Quit apps you don't need running, or remove icons you don't use, to make room.

Does Gubb run only in the menu bar?

No. Gubb is a regular window app with a Dock icon. The menu bar icon is a shortcut: left-click shows or hides the window, and right-click gives you Show Gubb, Enter License Key... (direct-download version) and Quit Gubb.