Luckily, the Dock is perfectly customizable. Today, we will teach you how to add apps to the Dock and remove them if they create clutter.
How to add or remove apps from the Dock?
The Mac Dock can also get cluttered with too many shortcut icons for documents and folders you visit often, making it hard to tell one app or document from another.
So before you start deleting apps and shortcuts, there are changes that can be made to the Dock settings that will tidy it up.
Go to the Apple menu > System Settings, then click Desktop & Dock in the sidebar. Here, you can change its size, customize the Dock's position, and change other default settings. You can also choose to automatically hide the Dock when you don't need it.
However, if making those adjustments doesn't solve the problem, and you want more space for apps you are now using, you need to start removing apps from the Dock.
How you add and remove apps from the Dock has changed over the years. It depends on which macOS you are currently using as to which approach is required. The Dock also comes with a few fixed items that can't be removed or changed, such as the Finder icon, Trash, and the divider line between where apps sit.
How to add an app to Dock? Adding an app is really simple.
Drag the app from the Applications folder, or Desktop, into the Dock. The Dock icon is only a shortcut (alias) to the app, so removing it from the Dock won't delete the app from your Mac.
Follow the steps below to do that.
Removing apps from Dock
- Control-click the app's icon in the Dock.
- Choose Options.
- Click Remove from Dock.
Alternatively, drag the app's icon out of the Dock until you see "Remove," then release.
Repeat these steps for all other apps you want to remove from the Dock.
How to find your hidden apps?
Some apps on your Mac are neither shown in the Dock nor in your Applications. These are called "launch agents." Such software plays a small supporting role for other applications. Although launch agents are meant to be practical and useful, they may slow down your Mac considerably.
I find CleanMyMac extremely useful for finding and disabling the launch agents. This software uncovers everything you have installed on your computer.
- Open CleanMyMac — get your free trial here.
- Go to the Performance feature and run a scan.
- Select Login Items or Background Items.
- Select the items you want to disable.
- Click Remove.
Well done. Now your Mac performance shouldn’t be interrupted.
Keeping the Dock tidy will ensure you have quick access to the apps you use often. If you don't use some of the applications, remove them from the Dock. Deleting an app from the Dock doesn't remove it from your Mac. You can then access it from Applications or the Desktop.
If it seems like some app is overloading your CPU, consider disabling its launch agents. It's also a good habit to check the Login Items tab in the CleanMyMac Applications feature to make sure you don't have many apps you don't even open.
