Ice
Free menu bar manager for Mac that hides, shows and rearranges your menu bar icons.
BartenderIce is a menu bar manager for macOS. Its main job is hiding menu bar items you do not need to see all the time, and showing them again when you want them.
Items can go in a hidden section or an always-hidden section. Hidden items come back when you hover over the menu bar, click an empty part of it, or scroll or swipe on it, and Ice can hide them again on its own. A drag-and-drop layout screen lets you order individual items. The Ice Bar shows hidden items in a separate bar under the menu bar, which helps on MacBooks with a notch. There is also item search, adjustable item spacing (beta), and menu bar styling with tint, shadow, border and rounded or split shapes. Hotkeys can toggle sections, open search and turn the Ice Bar on or off.
It suits people with a crowded menu bar who do not want to pay for a menu bar organizer. Some planned features, such as layout profiles, menu bar item groups and showing items when trigger conditions are met, are still on the roadmap and not built yet.
Ice is GPL-3.0 licensed and developed by Jordan Baird. It needs macOS 14 or later because it relies on system APIs added in that version. Development has slowed: the last stable release, 0.11.12, came out in October 2024, and the newest build is a 0.11.13 beta from September 2025 that targets problems on macOS 26 Tahoe.
Frequently asked questions
Is Ice free?
Yes. Ice is free with no paid tier. The developer takes donations through GitHub Sponsors and Buy Me a Coffee.
Is Ice safe and open source?
Ice is open source under the GPL-3.0 licence, with the code on GitHub. Since version 0.11.12 it can run in a limited mode without Screen Recording permission if you prefer not to grant it.
How do I install Ice?
Download Ice.zip from the latest GitHub release, unzip it and move Ice to Applications. With Homebrew, run brew install --cask jordanbaird-ice. Note the cask name: it is not just ice.
What macOS version does Ice need, and is it still updated?
Ice needs macOS 14 Sonoma or later. Updates have slowed a lot. The latest stable version is 0.11.12 from October 29, 2024. A 0.11.13 beta from September 2025 fixes most known issues on macOS 26 Tahoe and adopts the Liquid Glass design, but it is still marked as a pre-release, and there has been no newer build since.
How does Ice compare to Bartender?
Both hide, show and rearrange menu bar items. Bartender is a paid app; Ice is free and open source. Ice's own roadmap still lists profiles, item groups and trigger conditions as unfinished, so check that the features you rely on are there before switching.
How do I see hidden menu bar icons on a MacBook with a notch?
Turn on the Ice Bar. It shows your hidden items in a separate bar just below the menu bar, so icons that would sit behind the notch stay reachable. A hotkey can switch the Ice Bar on and off.
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