The Dock in macOS is more flexible than you may realize. Change the size, location, color and more to fit your personal preferences.
The Dock is one of Apple’s most iconic features. It showcases the intuitive nature of their design while remaining highly customizable!
Anyone can change what app shortcuts are available on the Dock. But what you may not realize is that you can also customize the Dock’s size, color, location, and more.
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Contents
Change the Size
The dock automatically resizes depending on how many apps it holds. However, you can also resize the icons themselves, making the Dock much larger or smaller.
The easiest way to do this is with your mouse. Simply hover it over one of the vertical dividers on the Dock, while clicking on the trackpad, and drag up or down to make the Dock bigger or smaller.
Alternatively, you can go to System Settings > Desktop & Dock. Here, you’ll see a Size slider.
Turn On Magnification
Magnification enlarges icons on the Dock as you hover your mouse over them. This is great for if you’ve got lots of icons, a small Dock, or a sight impairment.
Turn on Magnification by going to the Desktop & Dock menu of System Settings and ticking the Magnification checkbox. The slider lets you choose how much you want to magnify your Dock.
Change the Location
By default, the Dock sits at the bottom of the screen. However, if you prefer you could move it to the left or right edge instead. Depending on how you use your Mac, this might make it easier to access the Dock when you need it.
Change the location of the Dock by holding shift while you click and drag one of the vertical dividers. Pull your mouse to a different edge of the screen to see the Dock relocate to that position.
Alternatively, in the Dock System Settings, you can choose where you want the Dock to be positioned by selecting one of three options: Left, Bottom, or Right. Expand the dropdown menu to pick your preferred choice.
Hide the Dock
Free up some Desktop real estate by hiding your Dock when you don’t need it.
This handy feature allows more space for multitasking while keeping the Dock within easy reach off the screen. When you want the Dock to reappear, move your mouse to the screen’s edge and it will pop out — just like in fullscreen mode.
You can hide or show the Dock at any time by pressing cmd+alt+D. Or go to the Dock options in System Settings and toggle Automatically hide and show the Dock.
Change the Color
With Dark Mode on, the Dock, menu bar, Notification Center, Finder windows, Spotlight search, and more will be dark grey or black giving a sleek new look to macOS.
Go to System Settings > Appearance and click on Light, Dark, or Auto. Your Dock will then change colors accordingly.
Removing Apps From the Dock
The largest part of the Dock holds shortcuts to your favorite apps. They’re easy to add, remove, or reorder by clicking and dragging the icons.
Removing an app you don’t want in your Dock is easy:
- Go to the app in your dock. Click on it with Ctrl + trackpad.
- Select Options.
- Click on Remove From Dock.
After deleting an app from the Dock, you can still access it by going to your Launchpad or Applications folder.
Recent Applications
This new section of the Dock sits between favorite apps and the stack and files. It updates automatically with whatever apps are currently running or to show recently-used applications.
You can turn this feature on or off in the System Settings. In Desktop & Dock, turn Show Recent Applications in Dock off.
Stacks and Files
The farthest right section of the Dock is used to store stacks, files, and the Trash.
Stacks and files can be added to the Dock by dragging any files or folders from the Finder. Keeping them here makes them easily accessible and is useful if you use certain items frequently.
Stacks work just like folders: click to open and see all the files inside. By control-clicking a stack, you can customize how it opens: fan grid or list. You can also choose to view it as a traditional folder icon.
Extra Effects
In addition to the customization features we’ve already mentioned in this guide, you’ve got plenty of other options to change your Dock in a way that fits your needs.
Open Indicators
The little round dots that appear beneath icons on the Dock indicate whether that application is running or not. You can turn this effect on or off using the Systems Settings toggle labeled Show indicators for open applications.
Opening Animations
The System Settings toggle labeled Animate opening applications determines whether or not icons bounce up and down upon opening. Some users have suggested that turning this feature off improves performance in macOS, although for most users, the difference appears to be negligible at best. So, it’s worth experimenting and picking whichever option is a better choice for you.
Minimize Effect
The Minimize effect allows you to move an application’s window to the Dock when you aren’t using it. This is a great organization method and can help to clear multiple windows when working.
Through the System Settings, you can choose to store minimized windows within the app’s icon or to keep them in a row alongside your Stacks and Files. You can also choose to have a window minimize when you double-click its title bar.
Make Your macOS Dock Your Own
Knowing how to customize your dock in macOS will make it much easier to keep everything organized. You can decide on which apps feature, along with those that you’re not so interested in having. On top of that, you have the choice to change the size of your Mac Dock to fit your visual preferences.
When you switch between Light and Dark Mode, your macOS Dock will also change. You can adjust multiple aspects of this area on your device by going into your System Settings, so we recommend playing around with them.
Dan writes tutorials and troubleshooting guides to help people make the most of their technology. Before becoming a writer, he earned a BSc in Sound Technology, supervised repairs at an Apple Store, and even taught English in China.
Hello: I have a real easy, quick way to change dock color, would you like me to send it?
Sure!
I want to know how to MOVE an application position on the dock. For example from the 2nd placement to the fourth placement