How to uninstall Pika on Mac
This is Pika, the Mac color picker by superhighfives, rather than a browser with the same name. Copy any colors you want to keep into your design files before removing the app. The guide covers the official Mac download and the Homebrew cask pika; it does not assume that a saved color history can be recovered after deleting preferences.
Quit the color picker
Press Command + Q to quit Pika, as listed in its official keyboard shortcuts. Then move Pika.app from Applications to Trash. If the app starts again at login, check its entry in System Settings › General › Login Items & Extensions and turn it off.
Keep or reset the local settings
The Homebrew cask identifies these preference and launch-at-login helper locations. It does not document a separate color-library backup folder.
| Location | What to do |
|---|---|
| ~/Library/Preferences/com.superhighfives.Pika.plist | Keep for a reinstall, or move to Trash if you want to reset preferences. Save wanted colors first. |
| ~/Library/Application Scripts/com.superhighfives.Pika-LaunchAtLoginHelper | Inspect the Pika login helper's own scripts after quitting. Leave other apps' scripts alone. |
| ~/Library/Containers/com.superhighfives.Pika-LaunchAtLoginHelper | Inspect the helper's local container. Remove only this exact entry if you no longer need it and macOS allows removal. |
Use Finder's Shift + Command + G to inspect a path. If it is absent, skip it. A permission refusal is not a reason to delete the Containers or Application Scripts parent directory.
Check the app and helper
pgrep -il Pika
ls -d /Applications/Pika.app "$HOME/Library/Preferences/com.superhighfives.Pika.plist" "$HOME/Library/Containers/com.superhighfives.Pika-LaunchAtLoginHelper"
No output from pgrep means no matching process name is running; a match may be the app or its helper, so check it in Activity Monitor. A path printed by ls remains on disk. “No such file or directory” means that exact path is absent, and a permission error means the check could not establish its state. Kept preferences are an intentional choice.
If you installed it with Homebrew
brew uninstall --cask pika
This uninstalls without zap, and the cask's ordinary uninstall stanza also asks Pika to quit. A direct brew uninstall --cask --zap pika additionally removes the preferences and the two helper locations above, regardless of Mole's checkboxes.
Mole checks Homebrew's full removal list and skips --zap when it reaches unchecked data, shared files or anything it cannot verify. It still removes the leftovers you selected.
What Mole lists
Pika's own com.superhighfives.Pika preferences and identified temporary caches are selected by default when present. Separately identified login-helper containers and scripts are review rows. With the Remove data and settings with apps setting off, those review rows are listed but not selected; enabling it can preselect eligible data, so leave them unchecked if you want to keep their state.
This color picker uses com.superhighfives.Pika; do not apply these paths to a different app with the same name. macOS can refuse access to a helper container.
What this test covered
Pika 1.9.0 from the official package was copied to Applications, opened and uninstalled on September 21, 2026, without a Homebrew receipt. The app, preferences and identified temporary caches went to Trash, and no survivor was recorded from that removal list. Color-history recovery and a Homebrew-installed login helper were not verified.