How to Save Favorite Websites to Your Mac Menu Bar
There are sites that you might want to access with just one click. For example, your work email, your local radio station, or even ChatGPT. Sure, you can pin these sites to your favorite browser, but then you’ll have to search for these bookmarks every time you open it.
What if you could add these sites directly to your Mac menu? With one click, you could open YouTube Music or Instagram in a floating window on top of everything else? That’s possible with the MenubarX app, one of my favorite recent MacBook discoveries.
How to Use MenubarX App to Add Any Website to Mac Menu Bar
Once installed, MenubarX appears right in your menu bar. Click the MenubarX icon and you’ll see a variety of pre-built web apps designed to look like your phone’s home screen. From here, you can add sites like Instagram, YouTube, YouTube Music, ChatGPT, and more right to your menu bar. Or, you can add any URL you want. Planning a wedding? Put your wedding website right in your menu bar.
Here’s how it works. In the app’s phone-like interface, search for a site in the Google search bar at the top of the page. Then simply navigate to the site and tap on it, minimize it, or close the app to save it. Once the site is added, its icon will appear in the menu bar.
Or, if you want to save one of your ready-made web apps to your menu bar, simply click on it from the MenubarX home screen. The home screen will also display your open pages as separate apps.
While the app includes a lightweight browser, there’s no direct URL bar, so you’ll have to rely on Google to navigate. Once you open a website like Lifehacker, the MenubarX icon at the top of the page updates to the Lifehacker favicon, and you see the entire website in its mobile version floating on top of everything else on the screen.
To add more websites to the list, each with its own menu bar icon, right-click the MenubarX icon and select New Tab . Note that if you use a menu bar management utility like Ice or Barbee , you’ll first have to show new tabs before you can use them.
By default, each new tab opens in a floating window. You can use the “Dock” button to turn it into a pop-up window. This way, the window will be attached to the icon in the menu bar.
There are also quite a few settings available. First, you can resize the windows as you wish. By default, the app emulates a mobile interface. But you can also choose a specific browser resolution under Window Options > Window Size . Under Window Agent, you can also switch to a desktop interface if you want. On the settings page, you will also find a Refresh/Release option. Under Auto-Refresh, you can choose how often the page will automatically refresh. For example, you can add a news site here and set it to refresh every 30 minutes. Or, for example, every 5 minutes for X or Instagram.
You can also use the Pin icon to pin a window so it always floats on top of everything else you’re doing. Want to get rid of an unnecessary tab? Right-click the icon in the menu bar and select Close Tab .
Finally, if you pay for MenubarX Pro, you can also enable ad blocking by default. Upgrading to MenubarX Pro costs $6.99. It’s a one-time purchase that opens unlimited tabs and bookmarks, and lets you add your own window shortcuts, website icons, and home page (optional). MenubarX is also available on the Setapp app subscription service , where you get access to over 260 paid apps for a monthly fee of $9.99.