Ratings and reviews

BarTender has been one of my ‘always installed apps’ for many years but now nothing seems to be able to tame the issues with Tahoe menu bars on multi-screen setups. The bar works on a single screen but on multi-monitor setups, some of the icons on ‘inactive’ screens is a mess of some icons being visible and most greyed out. I can’t add a screenshot here but it’s an annoying mess. Looking at my menu bars right now, on the main MacBook Pro screen that I am using, the full menu bar is visible, but on my 2 additional screens, i have a couple of icons that keep flickering as almost visible and then not, then one icon is visible, then about 5 blank spaces, then the battery icon, then a space (where an icon appears on the active screen) then the wifi and volume icon, then a space, then the 2 slider menu (for quick access to tools) then the date and time. It’s a mess that probably isn’t doen to failings of BarTender. Just an unsighly mess.

Doesn’t work without access to screen recording. I understand that some features may require this permission, but it would be great to be able to use the subset of features that don’t require it.

I have used bartender for years and it is a consistent source of annoyance, it consistently glitches and has to be restarted. Frustatingly it is the only menu bar app with mutliple profiles. However after upgrading to Mac OS Tahoe it is so glitchy it renders my computer unuseable. Switching to ice. Developer please get your stuff together and do better

Newest version causes lots of weird behavior. Control center icons flashing (with screen diming) randomly on both sides of the screen (top right and left) and taking over the mouse. Just unreliable like it used to be and interupts my workflow. Uninstalling for now.

Why do you need to capture my screen every 5 minutes? I get its needed for display, but why so freqently. Also feels like this app has become way more buggier, hard to justify its benifit vs the annoyance it became.

Outstanding app. Thank you for fixing the recent compatibility issues!

good

This was one of the best utilties out there, but the Tahoe update has been a mess of weird cursor and icon behavior and CPU/memory usage. While I was a diehard user for years, I can’t reccomend Bartender in good conscience for now.

New version takes way too muc CPU-time, at random mouse bumps (screen capture at random), touchpad gets disactivated etc. This is an absolute disaster.

Latest version (6.3.0) causes my mac (15.7.3) working very slow. The scroll expereince is glitchy in all the apps: Slack, Safari, Chrome, etc. I had to stop using Bartender :(

Works fine functionally but takes an exorbitant amount of system resources for its intended purpose. I recommend Ice Menu Bar instead.

I’ve given up, bartender is slowing my mac down so much since a while, using 6gb of RAM sometimes… shame really, gonna uninstall

Used to be great, but since Tahoe it's been virtually unusable. Glitchy and inconsitent while also randomly interfering with my mouse and keyboard. Do better.

Hasn't worked since Tahoe came out. Kept trying to use it til the end of Dec 25, but had to give up in the end. Good app before then, shame really.

Stop stealing my mouse!! I will be working hard, and suddenly my mouse no longer functions. It’s stuck in the Apple menu because Bartender grabbed it while it rearranged the menu. This happens anytime there’s an update to a hidden item. It’s truly distracting. I’m starting to look for an alternative. Bartender is one of the main reasons I subscribe to Setapp. I will update this rating if the app improves.

I have been using for a long time but it is very unstable on Tahoe

Became very bugy thru updates. I just deinstalled it. _______ My first review, some versions ago: Awesome App! What I like probably the most, is that you can seperate the menubar in a left and a right part. I never even thought about it, but I love it!

v6.30. Unfortunately this app remains unusable for me. On Tahoe. Takes control of mouse randomly, menus slow to open. And the actual Bartender app will freeze intermittantly. It used to work perfectly, now I find it an irritation. I have removed it for now.

Trying again after losing faith in v5… Bartender used to be great. At some point shortly after the app was taken over by a new developer, it started acting really buggy – This may have been related to the arrival of new a Mac OS, but still, developers can get ahead of new OS issues and the ones who took over Bartender didn’t seem to be on top of things. Emails to their support mostly went unanswered, espcially after I did everything that was advised to do – it’s almost like they were stumped and too embaressed to admit it. I’m now back trying v6.3.0 and we’ll see how it goes…

Used Bartender for years but the update after MacOS26 has made it unusable.