Can’t find Mic Drop in your Mac menu bar?

Mic Drop lives in your Mac’s menu bar, the strip of icons at the top-right of your screen. If you can’t see it there, it's probably still running, but hidden. Here’s how to find it and how to keep it visible.

Mic Drop’s icon looks like a microphone, and changes to show whether you’re muted:

Your icon might look a little different. Mic Drop has four icon styles, in colour or greyscale.

Quick fix: open Mic Drop again

Open Mic Drop the same way you’d open any app. Press ⌘Space to open Spotlight, type “Mic Drop”, and press Return. You can also double-click Mic Drop in your Applications folder.

Mic Drop will open its menu right away, wherever its icon is. If Mic Drop wasn’t running, this will start it.

Your keyboard shortcut keeps working even when the icon is hidden, so you can still mute and unmute even if Mic Drop doesn’t appear in your menu bar. You can also use Mic Check to see your mute status.

Show Mic Drop in the Dock

Turn on Show in Dock in Mic Drop’s settings (Settings > General) and Mic Drop gets a Dock icon too. Click it to open Mic Drop’s menu, even when the menu bar icon is hidden.

Check your Menu Bar settings

On macOS Tahoe (macOS 26) and later, you can choose which apps are allowed in the menu bar. If Mic Drop is disabled here, its icon won’t appear at all.

1. Open the Apple menu and choose System Settings.
2. Click Menu Bar in the sidebar.
3. Scroll down to Allow in the Menu Bar and turn on Mic Drop.

Look for hidden menu bar icons

When there are more icons than fit in your menu bar, macOS has to hide some of them.

On macOS 27 and later, a button appears in your menu bar when icons don’t fit. Click it to show the hidden icons, including Mic Drop.

On earlier versions of macOS, icons that don’t fit just disappear entirely. On MacBooks with a notch at the top of the screen, they can also end up hidden behind the notch. Try quitting a few menu bar apps you don’t need, or disabling them in System Settings > Menu Bar.

Keep Mic Drop visible

Once you’ve found Mic Drop, there are a few ways to make sure you don’t lose it again.

Move Mic Drop closer to the clock

Hold down ⌘ (Command) and drag Mic Drop’s icon to the right, towards the clock. Icons on the far left of your menu bar are the first to be hidden when space runs out.

Show Mic Drop in your Dock

Open Mic Drop’s settings and turn on Show in Dock. Clicking Mic Drop’s Dock icon will open its menu, even if the menu bar icon is hidden. (More about Mic Drop’s Dock icon.)

Still can’t find Mic Drop?

Send us an email and let us know which version of macOS you’re using. We’ll help you track it down.