Only active apps in your Mac Dock
You can arrange the Mac’s Dock according to your own preferences. If you use a lot of programs, the Dock quickly becomes confusing, with all those icons. With the tips from this article you will clean up your Mac Dock and only see active applications in the Dock.
- Mac Dock showing only running apps
- Clean up Mac Dock by uninstalling apps
- Clean up Mac Dock by creating folders
Mac Dock: Show only running apps
If you use a lot of apps, your Dock quickly turns into a busy list of app icons. You can do something about that by only making active programs visible in your Dock. The rest is hidden.
This works as follows:
- Open the Terminal program via Applications > Utilities > Terminal.
- Type the following command into the command line and press Enter. But look after: since macOS Mojave it is not that easy to undo this. Additionally, the interactive corner settings will be reset.
defaults write com.apple.dock static-only -bool TRUE; killall Dock
The Dock will now restart automatically, showing only the active programs. As you can see, the list of app icons in the Dock has now become a lot shorter:
A disadvantage of the fact that you only see active icons is that you can no longer drag documents to the icons. In macOS it is very useful that you can drag a file (for example an image) from the Finder to an app icon, after which the app in question will immediately open.
To restore the default setting for the Dock in macOS Mojave, enter the following command in the Terminal:
defaults delete com.apple.dock; killall Dock
In macOS High Sierra and older you can easily return. When you want to undo it, type exactly the same command but instead of TRUE you use FALSE, like this:
defaults write com.apple.dock static-only -bool FALSE; killall Dock
Mac Dock: Clean up apps
Of course, there are more ways to make your Dock more organized. Take a critical look at all the app icons you have in the list. Some of it you use very rarely, so you can delete it. This works as follows:
- Place the cursor on the icon you want to remove from the Dock.
- Hold your finger on the mouse button and drag up.
- The icon now disappears with a pop, but has not disappeared from the Mac.
You can find the app again via Programs. You can also open apps in a different way, for example via Launchpad or Spotlight (the magnifying glass at the top right).
Mac Dock: Create folders
Do you want to keep all programs within reach, but would you like to organize them a little more? Then it is good to know that you can also use folders in the Dock. By default there are already a number of folders in the list, namely Downloads and Programs. Drag your favorite folders with apps there, which can also contain website shortcuts and documents, for example.
We have more helpful tips about the Mac Dock, including resetting the Dock to its original settings or safely removing applications from your Mac.
