How to uninstall Bartender 7 on Mac

Bartender rearranges your menu bar, so the thing to expect after removing it is that the menu bar goes back to macOS's own layout and the items Bartender was hiding show again. Your license is not tied to this Mac: Bartender's support page says a license covers all Macs you own and personally use, so there is nothing to deactivate. This guide covers Bartender 7 from Surtees Studios' download and the Homebrew cask bartender.

Quit Bartender and remove the app

  1. Quit Bartender from its menu bar menu or its settings window.
  2. Search Activity Monitor for Bartender and check that it has exited.
  3. Move Bartender 7 from Finder's Applications folder to the Trash.
  4. Open System Settings › Privacy & Security and remove Bartender from Accessibility and from Screen & System Audio Recording. The support page names both permissions; the entries stay after the app is gone until you remove them.
  5. Check System Settings › General › Login Items & Extensions and turn off any Bartender entry that remains.

Removing the app does not affect your Bartender license. Keep the license email for a reinstall; the support page links a license lookup if you lose it.

Where Bartender keeps its data

These are the locations the Homebrew cask's zap list names for Bartender 7. Check each with Shift + Command + G in Finder and skip what does not exist.

Location What to do
~/Library/Application Support/Bartender 7 Keep it for a reinstall; remove it when you no longer need your setup
~/Library/Group Containers/24J875RH8J.com.surteesstudios.Bartender Shared data for Bartender's own app group; remove it with the app when you are done with Bartender
~/Library/Application Scripts/24J875RH8J.com.surteesstudios.Bartender Scripts folder for the same group; remove it with the group container
~/Library/Preferences/com.surteesstudios.Bartender.plist Preferences; remove only for a clean start
~/Library/Caches/com.surteesstudios.Bartender and ~/Library/HTTPStorages/com.surteesstudios.Bartender Caches and web storage; safe to remove after quitting
~/Library/Application Support/com.surteesstudios.Bartender.revenuecat and ~/Library/Caches/com.surteesstudios.Bartender.revenuecat Data from RevenueCat, a purchase library Bartender uses; safe to remove with the app

Leave a plain ~/Library/Application Support/revenuecat or ~/Library/Caches/RevenueCat alone: those names are shared by other apps that use the same library.

Check for older system components

Older Bartender versions could install components outside your home folder, and the Homebrew cask still removes them if present: an install helper, an audio plugin and scripting additions. These read-only commands show whether any is left:

pgrep -il bartender
ls /Library/PrivilegedHelperTools | grep -i bartender
ls /Library/Audio/Plug-Ins/HAL | grep -i bartender
ls /Library/ScriptingAdditions | grep -i bartender
  • No output from pgrep means Bartender is not running.
  • No output from the three ls lines means none of those components is on this Mac, which is normal for a Bartender 7 install.
  • A com.surteesstudios.Bartender.BartenderInstallHelper, BartenderAudioPlugIn.plugin or BartenderHelper.osax entry is left over from an older version. Remove only that entry, in Finder, with administrator authorization; never remove the folder around it.

If you installed it with Homebrew

The bartender cask's uninstall step unloads com.surteesstudios.Bartender.BartenderInstallHelper and deletes the install helper, the audio plugin and the scripting additions listed above. Its zap list trashes every location in the data table, plus Bartender's cookies and its recent-documents entry. brew uninstall --cask --zap bartender therefore removes your Bartender setup along with the app.

To keep your setup for a reinstall:

brew uninstall --cask bartender

Mole adds --zap only when every path on the zap list sits inside ~/Library, none of them touches a row you left unchecked, and no other installed app claims them. ~/Library/Application Support/Bartender 7 and the group container are listed but unselected by default, so Mole leaves --zap out unless you tick them. A brew command you type yourself never consults Mole's checkboxes.

What Mole lists

For Bartender 7 from Surtees Studios' download:

  • ~/Library/Application Support/Bartender 7 is listed but not selected.
  • Caches, preferences, cookies and HTTP storage filed under com.surteesstudios.Bartender are selected by default. In the test, the com.surteesstudios.Bartender.revenuecat support folder was selected and removed too.
  • The group container and its scripts folder, taken from the Homebrew zap list, are listed but not selected.
  • If an old install helper exists in /Library/PrivilegedHelperTools, it is listed but not selected.
  • Mole does not edit privacy permissions or login items. Shared revenuecat folders are not listed.

What this test covered

On September 19, 2026, Bartender 7 was copied from Surtees Studios' download into Applications, opened, and uninstalled with a Preview build of Mole 1.15. There was no Homebrew receipt, and the license screen did not block the test. The empty ~/Library/Application Support/com.surteesstudios.Bartender.revenuecat folder was removed with the app. The 24J875RH8J.com.surteesstudios.Bartender group container was not listed by that build and stayed on disk. No license, menu bar layout or Homebrew install was tested.