How to uninstall Dash on Mac

Dash files its support data in two places under Application Support: one folder named after its bundle identifier, which Mole selects by default, and one named after the app, Dash, which Mole lists separately so you can look inside before deciding. Your snippet library can live in a location you picked yourself, so find it first. This guide covers the official download from Kapeli and the Homebrew cask dash.

Find your snippet library first

Kapeli's user guide says the snippet library location can be changed in Dash's Settings › Snippets, for example to sync it through Dropbox or iCloud Drive. Open that pane before uninstalling, note where the library is, and copy it somewhere safe if you want to keep your snippets. A library stored in Dropbox or iCloud Drive is not listed by Mole.

Quit Dash and remove the app

  1. Quit Dash from its application menu.
  2. Check Activity Monitor for a lingering Dash process.
  3. In Finder's Applications folder, move Dash to the Trash. Kapeli's own Dash page and user guide describe Dash's documentation and snippet features but do not publish an uninstall page or a list of data locations, so the locations below come from the local test recorded for this guide and the Homebrew cask's zap list.

Where its data lives

Location What it holds What to do
~/Library/Application Support/com.kapeli.dashdoc Support data filed under Dash's bundle ID Selected by default. Untick it if you have not yet found and copied your snippet library.
~/Library/Application Support/Dash Filed under the app's display name rather than its bundle ID; in the recorded test it held about 6.2 MB Listed but not selected. Look inside before deleting.
~/Library/Caches/com.kapeli.dashdoc Application cache Selected by default
~/Library/Caches/com.plausiblelabs.crashreporter.data/com.kapeli.dashdoc Crash-reporting SDK cache Selected by default
~/Library/Cookies/com.kapeli.dashdoc.binarycookies Cookies Selected by default
~/Library/HTTPStorages/com.kapeli.dashdoc and com.kapeli.dashdoc.binarycookies Network storage Selected by default
~/Library/Logs/Dash App logs Selected by default
~/Library/Preferences/com.kapeli.dashdoc.plist App preferences Selected by default
~/Library/Saved Application State/com.kapeli.dashdoc.savedState Window state Selected by default
~/Library/WebKit/com.kapeli.dashdoc Web view data Selected by default

If you installed it with Homebrew

Mole checks the cask's zap list first: when it reaches a row you left unticked, Mole drops --zap and still cleans up the rows you selected through its own recoverable Trash step.

The dash cask's zap list matches every path above, including the display-name Application Support/Dash folder. Because that folder is unticked by default, Mole normally runs brew uninstall --cask dash without --zap. If you tick that folder too, every path in the zap list is then covered by your own selection.

Running the zap step yourself moves everything above to the Trash regardless of what you ticked in Mole:

brew uninstall --cask --zap dash

To keep the Dash folder, look inside it first, back it up if it holds anything you want, then remove only the app:

brew uninstall --cask dash

Check the result

pgrep -il dash
ls -d ~/Library/Application\ Support/com.kapeli.dashdoc ~/Library/Application\ Support/Dash
  • No output from pgrep means no Dash process is running. The match is case-insensitive and can also catch unrelated processes with "dash" in their name, so check the process name before assuming it is Dash.
  • ls -d prints each folder that still exists and reports "No such file or directory" for the rest.

What Mole lists

For Dash installed from the official download:

  • Everything filed under com.kapeli.dashdoc (Application Support, caches, cookies, HTTP storage, logs, preferences, saved state, WebKit data) is selected by default.
  • ~/Library/Application Support/Dash, filed under the display name, is listed but not selected.

For a Homebrew install, the zap list reaches the display-name folder, so Mole normally leaves --zap out unless you tick that row too.

What this test covered

On September 20, 2026, Dash 8.1.1 was copied from the official download into Applications, opened, and removed with a Preview build of Mole 1.15 (build 280); there was no Homebrew receipt. The unselected Application Support/Dash folder, about 6.2 MB, was listed but not ticked in that run, so it stayed on disk; Mole did list it, so this was not a gap in what Mole checks. Signing in, snippets and the Homebrew cask were not tested.