Hide Recent App Mac Dock

13-05-2021

Hide Recent App Mac Dock

The Dock in macOS is more flexible than you may realize. Change the size, location, color and more to fit your personal preferences.

Jan 16, 2019 How to hide recent applications on the Dock on macOS Mojave Much like iOS on the iPad, macOS Mojave puts users' recently-used applications in a special section of the Dock. If this doesn't sound like your cup of tea, it's easy enough to turn off. Oct 05, 2017 Start off by opening up the Settings app and tapping on “General”. From there, select “Multitasking & Dock”. At the bottom, tap on the toggle switch to the right of “Show Suggested and Recent Apps” to turn it off”. No more recent apps in the dock. All that will show up are only the apps that you specifically put there.

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.

Contents

9 Extra Effects

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.

There are two ways to do this: with the mouse or through the System Preferences.

Using the mouse is quickest. Simply hover it over one of the vertical dividers on the Dock and drag up or down to make the Dock bigger or smaller. If that wasn’t easy enough, open the System Preferences and click the Dock button. The slider at the top of the window adjusts your Dock size.

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 Dock menu of System Preferences and ticking the Magnification checkbox. The slider to the right allows you to alter the amount of magnification to your personal taste.

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 Preferences, you can choose where you want the Dock to be positioned by selecting one of three options: Left, Bottom, or Right.

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 Preferences and tick ‘Automatically hide and show the Dock’.

Change the Color

With Dark Mode on, the Dock, menu bar, Notification Centre, Finder windows, Spotlight search, and more will be dark grey or black giving a sleek new look to macOS.

Turn on Dark Mode by going into the General menu of your System Preferences. Two boxes of the top give the options of Light or Dark color schemes.

Favorite Apps

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.

To remove an app, drag it off of the Dock or into the Trash — don’t worry, it’ll still be available to in Spotlight or Finder.

Alternately drag apps onto the Dock from the Finder window to add them to your favorites. You could also drag apps from the recent applications section of the Dock into your favorites to create permanent shortcuts.

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 three recently used applications.

You can turn this feature on or off in the System Preferences. Under the Dock menu, check or uncheck the box labeled ‘Show recent applications in Dock’.

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

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 Preferences checkbox labeled ‘Show indicators for open applications’.

Opening Animations

The System Preferences checkbox 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.

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 Preferences, 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.

We hope that gives you some insight into how to customize the Dock on macOS. Experiment to find your favorite settings and let us know them in the comments!

Dan is a freelance writer based in South West England.

He spent two years supervising repairs as a Genius Admin for Apple Retail and uses that knowledge to keep our troubleshooting guides up to date.

Long before that, Dan turned to Apple products from a musical background. Having owned iPods for years, he bought a MacBook to learn sound recording and production. It was using those skills that he gained a first-class Bachelor of Science in Sound Technology.

Your Mac comes with a small panel along the edge of the screen called the Dock: It lets you quickly access your favorite apps, files, and folders, as well as any actively-running apps. When you save an item to the Dock, you can access it at any time by clicking on it.

By default, most of Apple's built-in apps start with shortcuts saved in the Dock, but you can also remove those shortcuts and add your own. You can also customize the Dock to fit your preferences. Here's how.

What is the Dock, and what gets displayed there?

The Dock has been with the Mac for over a decade, now: It offers you a quick way to access the Finder (your Mac's underlying filesystem) as well as your currently running applications, favorite apps, favorite files or folders, and the Trash.

When you first set up your Mac, your Dock lives along the bottom of your screen in a translucent rectangle; if you don't like its positioning, you can move it to the left or right of the screen, or have it automatically hide whenever you're not interacting with it. Items are organized as follows, left to right:

The Finder
Favorite app shortcuts
Currently-running apps (you can also choose in the Dock preferences whether you want to view an indicator (a little black dot) for currently-open apps)
Favorite files or folders
The Trash

Though you can shuffle the position of app shortcuts in the Dock, you can't move the Finder or Trash — they live on opposite ends of the Dock, respectively — nor can you mix file shortcuts with apps in the same section.

How to add apps to the Dock on your Mac

Launch a Finder window from your Dock.
Click on Applications in the sidebar.
Select an app and drag it to the Dock.
Let go of the app while it hovers over the Dock.

If you want to permanently add a currently-running app to your Dock:

Right-click or Control-click on the app icon in the Dock.
Select Options under the drop-down menu.
Click on Keep in Dock.

You can alternatively just drag the icon to a different position in your Dock, which will automatically save it as a favorite shortcut.

Mac Hide Dock Icon

How to add files and folders to the Dock on your Mac

Files and folders can also be saved to your Dock, but they can only be stored on the far right of the Dock, after your app shortcuts. The Dock has a demarcating line that separates apps from files and folders, so you won't mix them up.

Launch a Finder window from your Dock.
Select a file or folder from its location on your Mac and drag it to the right side of the Dock.
Let go of the file or folder while it hovers over the right side of the Dock.

How to remove apps, files, and folders from the Dock on your Mac

If you don't want a particular app, file or folder in your Dock anymore, you can remove it with just one gesture. Note that this doesn't remove the item from your computer, it just removes the shortcut from the Dock; you can always re-add the app or folder by following the steps above.

Select an app, file, or folder and drag it out of the Dock.
When it is hovering over your desktop, you will see the word Remove appear above the app, file, or folder.
Let go of the app, file, or folder. It will disappear from the Dock.
Repeat the steps above to remove all items you no longer want to kept in the Dock.

Note: If you do this on a currently-open app, it will continue to stay in the Dock until you Quit the application, at which point it will disappear.

How to organize the Dock on your Mac

You can rearrange the placement of apps, files, and folders in your Dock so they are in alphabetical order, color-coordinated, or however you like.

Note: You can't move the Finder or Trash icons to the far left and right of the Dock respectively. They are anchored to the Dock because of their importance to the system.

Select an app, file, or folder in the Dock.
Drag it to a new location in the Dock.
Let go of the app, file, or folder while it hovers over the new location in the Dock.

How to change the Dock's size on your Mac

You can adjust the size of the dock so that icons are larger or smaller on your screen.

Mac Hide Dock Shortcut

Click on the Apple icon in the upper left corner of your Mac's screen.
Select System Preferences from the drop down menu.
Click on Dock.
Drag the Size slider to the left or right to increase or decrease the size of the Dock.
Tick the box for Magnification to enable an animation that makes the items in the Dock that your cursor hovers over larger.
Drag the Magnification slider to the left or right to increase or decrease how large the icons grow when your cursor hovers over them.

How to change the Dock's orientation on your Mac

You can display the Dock on the bottom, right, or left side of your screen.

Click on the Apple icon in the upper left corner of your Mac's screen.
Select System Preferences from the drop down menu.
Click on Dock.
Select Left, Bottom, or Right to change the orientation of the Dock.

How to automatically hide or show the Dock on your Mac

On smaller laptop screens, every bit of screen space is valuable. If you don't want the Dock getting in the way of your productivity, you can keep it hidden until you want to access it, at which point, you can call it back up by hovering your cursor over the place where it normally resides.

Click on the Apple icon in the upper left corner of your Mac's screen.
Select System Preferences from the drop down menu.
Click on Dock.
Tick the box for Automatically hide and show the Dock.

How to hide recent applications on the Dock on macOS Mojave

Much like iOS on the iPad, macOS Mojave puts users' recently-used applications in a special section of the Dock. If this doesn't sound like your cup of tea, it's easy enough to turn off.

Open System Preferences from your Dock or Applications folder.
Click Dock.
Click the checkbox next to Show recent applications in Dock so that the check disappears (it's on by default).

You can check the box if you decide you want to use this feature.

Bonus: Pro tips for using the Dock

You can change the size of the Dock by positioning the cursor over the Dock divider that separates apps from files and folders. The cursor will change to a double-sided arrow; click and drag to increase or decrease the size of the Dock.
You can change the location of the Dock by holding down the shift key, clicking on that divider, and dragging the Dock to the left, bottom, or right sides of the screen.
If you'd like to keep an app that's open in the Dock permanently, right or control-click the icon in the Dock, select Options and select Keep in Dock.
If you want to add spacers between apps, there's a Terminal command to do so.

macOS Catalina

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How To Remove Recent Apps From Dock

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