Read Me

What Pearbar can see and do

Pearbar uses the Mac's Accessibility permission for three things: reading the menus of the app in front of you, seeing where that app's front window is, and choosing a menu item when you click it in the bar.

It goes online for one thing: checking for updates, and only once you've said yes. Watch it in a firewall app like Little Snitch or LuLu if you'd like to check. If you turn on Record Diagnostic Log, it writes app names, menu names and the commands you choose (which can include the names of recent documents) to a log file on your Mac, and nowhere else.

Screens

With one menu bar for all your displays, the black band stays on that display while Pearbar follows your window to the others. Gear › Menu Bar › Show Real Menus When Pearbar Is on Another Display puts the regular menu bar back there while you're away. MacBooks with a notch get the band on both sides of it.

Keyboard

⌃⌥M opens the menus at the bar, and ← → move between them. ⌃⌥/ searches every menu of the app you're in.

Uninstall

Click the gear, then Help & Troubleshooting › Uninstall Pearbar. It quits, removes its login item, settings and log, resets its Accessibility permission, and moves itself to the Trash.

Known limitations

Apps that draw their own menus inside the window, instead of using the Mac menu bar, have no real menus to mirror.
Pearbar needs Accessibility permission. If you turn it off, Pearbar stops until you allow it again.
Apple silicon and macOS 14 Sonoma or later only.
Mac only. There's no Windows version, and after the glass guy, there won't be.

Not affiliated with Apple Inc. Pears are not apples.

Pearbar

Not ready to drag just yet.

Pearbar Demo.mov

A 45-second recording of Pearbar on a wide screen, no sound. The menus follow a Pages window as it moves. Pearbar hides the real menu bar and the menu bar extras, changes color, adds a line along the top, swaps its icon for an emoji or your own image, flicks to the middle, pins and resizes, parks in the corner like 1984, searches every menu, and rolls up like a window shade.

0:00

Introducing Pearbar

Introducing Pearbar.

The menu bar, moved to
where you actually work.

Early pears: $6.66 instead of $13 · Version 1.0 included. One email when it opens, and we never share your address.

In early testing
Apple silicon
macOS 14+

Mail

Notes

Screens grew. The menus stayed in the corner.

4.0in.

It's the same pair (pear) as always, the window and its menus. Now they sit together.

Everything it does fits in one menu.

Pears are not apples.

Pearbar puts a pear where the Apple menu used to be. Not a pear person? Pick a skull, a goat, a pentagram or a poop, any emoji on your Mac, or your own artwork: drop in an SVG or PNG, your logo, your cat, your band, and that’s the menu now. The app has a secret stash on top of that. We’re not saying where.

Icon Caps

or any emoji
on your Mac or your own
artwork

Press a cap. The pear up top changes too.

Your hand has a commute.

Every trip to the File menu is a little walk up and to the left. Pick your screen and see how far it adds up.

From the middle of a 49-inch screen, the File menu is 23.9 inches away. Each way.

Hand Odometer

1 Which screen is yours?

2 How often do you reach for a menu?

20

times an hour. About average.

01234567890012345678900123456789001234567890.01234567890

miles a year your hand doesn’t walk,
with Pearbar

Counts every trip there and back, 8 hours a day, 250 days a year. With Pearbar the trip is about half an inch.

Zero miles. Your hand can stay parked.

Half an inch was the Pearbar commute. From the keyboard, it’s none. Every menu of the app in front is searchable: type three letters, press Return, and Pearbar finds the command, even three submenus deep, even the ones hiding behind “Other.” We looked.

⌃⌥/

Try “pdf”, “zoom” or “checklist”. ↑ ↓ to pick, Return to do the thing.

The search box in your Help menu? Pearbar swaps it for Search Menus… so it’s one habit, not two.

←→Hop between them. Try it on Pearbar up top. We’ll wait.

One menu bar. Several screens. A notch.

The corner gets farther away the more screen you buy. Pearbar goes wherever your window does.

Screens

Ultrawide. On a 49-inch screen the corner is a zip code away. Pearbar rides with the window, wherever on the acre it lands.
Two displays. macOS gives one display the menu bar. Pearbar follows your window to the other one anyway, menus in tow. Window straddling the seam? The bar can straddle it too.
The notch. MacBooks with a camera notch get the black band on both sides of it, and Pearbar never parks under the camera. It knows better.

Will it run on your Mac?

If it has Apple silicon and a recent macOS, yes. Here’s the whole checklist, including a couple of things it doesn’t need.

Pearbar Requirements

Apple silicon. M1 or newer. Intel Macs, we had a good run.
macOS 14 Sonoma or later. Sonoma, Sequoia, and whatever they name the next one. When Apple changes things, the fix arrives as an update.
Accessibility permission. One switch in System Settings so it can read and click your menus. It asks nicely.
At least one window. Something for Pearbar to sit above. Most people have plenty.
Your apps, as they are. Stage Manager, save panels and alerts carry on as usual. Pearbar steps aside for them.
Light or dark mode. Wears whatever your Mac is wearing.
An internet connection. Pearbar goes online for one thing, checking for updates, and only once you’ve said yes. Nothing else leaves your Mac.
Not needed
A 49-inch screen. Pearbar is handy on a laptop. It shows off on an ultrawide.
Not needed
Windows. We tried once. Someone had to call the glass guy.
Not needed

Not sure? Choose Apple menu › About This Mac. It lists your chip and your macOS.

Not affiliated with Apple Inc. Made for big screens.