Better Touch Tool Touch Bar



I love the Touch Bar. That's why I was so upset that Apple just sat on its useless user interface. So, inspired by Vas3k's popular blog post on the subject, and determined to make good on the promise that Apple broke, I've spent a (ridiculous) amount of time reworking the foundations of the Touch Bar into GoldenChaos-BTT: a true general purpose Touch Bar UI with support for tons of apps that's intuitive enough to make you love your Touch Bar again - or, more likely, for the first time.

BetterTouchTool turns it into hard-working assistant that with a tap or a gesture you can have launch apps, change brightness, swap Spaces and make windows snap to the sides of your screen. BetterTouchTool enables you to reimagine the Touch Bar the way you’ve always wanted. From precisely editing the existing setup to creating new functional buttons to even defining the spacing between elements, your Touch Bar will be able to encompass unique triggers that.

Want to buy me a coffee? You can donate here: https://paypal.me/GoldenChaos

Thinking about buying BetterTouchTool because of this preset?Use this link and I'll get 40%. 🙂

Need help or have a feature request? Visit the GC-BTT thread on the BetterTouchTool forums and make a post!

Latest stable version: GoldenChaos-BTT 3.392

Verified by the BetterTouchTool developer, thoroughly tested by the community.
(Jun 30 2020 - Release Notes) Fully tested on macOS Big Sur; New GC macOS menu bar item, context menu, and about window; Support for BusyCal; Always show media controls; Support for more Sony headphones; Improvements to running app detection performance

Latest experimental version: None

Newer features, but less tested. Generally stable, but read the release notes first.

How to Install

Touch

Better Touch Tool Torrent

  1. Make sure you're using the latest version of BetterTouchTool.
  2. Follow one of the two release links at the top of this post and click 'Direct import to BTT'.
  3. Say yes to BTT when it asks if you want to import the preset.
  4. [Upgrades only] Say yes when BTT asks if you want to overwrite your existing GC-BTT.
You're all set! Use the built-in settings window to customize GC-BTT to your liking.
'Singlehandedly vindicates the Touch Bar's existence.' kdhyde on the BetterTouchTool forums
'Whenever someone calls the Touch Bar useless, I just show them this.' KungFuJoe on the BetterTouchTool forums
'The way Apple should have implemented the Touch Bar in the first place.' @wowthatisrandom, developer of Forecastbar and InstaCal
'What I would have wanted the Touch Bar to be stock.' truublue on the BetterTouchTool forums
'SUPERB.' u/townfox on Reddit
'Genius.' Harrumph on the BetterTouchTool forums
'INCREDIBLE.' peripatew on the BetterTouchTool forums
'A very big preset' Andreas Hegenberg, developer of BetterTouchTool

Home Strip

The default key set when nothing is open. Fullscreen doubles as escape key; tap for escape, long-press for fullscreen.

Open a browser, and browser controls appear in the Home Strip.

Open more apps to reveal a wide range of dynamic controls and widgets. Close apps to dismiss their controls.

Modifier Menus

Hold command, option, or control to access the app switcher, control strip, or window snapping controls.

Dynamic Menu Bar

Dynamic Menu Bar with three size options lets you dedicate as much or as little space to widgets as you like.

Widget Groups

Better Touch Tool Touch Bar

Widget Groups like Emoji Picker, Browser Tabs, and Language Switcher replace the Home Strip, but not the Menu Bar.

Modal Widgets

Access expanded-view Modal Widgets by long-pressing on Weather, Now Playing, Reminders, Calendar, Volume, and more.

Dock Badges

Dock Badges appear on the left side of the Touch Bar and remain sticky.

Built-in Dock Badge support for all of your favorite third party apps; enable or disable them in the GC-BTT Settings menu.

Dock Badges also support handoff!

Convenient Settings Window

The straightforward GC-BTT Settings panel (⌘⌥⇧P) makes it easy to deeply customize your Touch Bar.

Only install the latest version unless you have a specific troubleshooting reason. If you do need to install an older version for whatever reason, make sure the version of BetterTouchTool you're running is greater than or equal to the GoldenChaos-BTT version you're installing.

Better Touch Tool Free

Notes

Better Touch Tool Touch Bar Reddit

  • Versions 3.186 and earlier require icalBuddy (brew install ical-buddy) for the reminders widgets to work.
  • Versions 3.065-4 and earlier require icalBuddy (brew install ical-buddy) for the calendar and reminders widget to work.
  • Versions 2.543 and earlier require the Python Requests module (pip install requests) and Locateme (brew install locateme) for the weather widget to work.
  • Versions 2.531 and earlier require the calendar widget to first be edited to include the names of the calendars that you wish to display.
  • Versions 2.516 and earlier require Location Helper and JSON Helper for the weather widget to work. Not compatible with macOS Mojave.

Version history

  • [Verified] [Stable] 3.392 (Jun 30 2020)
  • [Verified] [Stable] 3.368 (May 2 2020)
  • [Experimental] 3.358 (Apr 16 2020)
  • [Experimental] 3.352 (Mar 29 2020)
  • [Experimental] 3.346 (Mar 17 2020)
  • [Experimental] 3.335 (Feb 20 2020)
  • [Verified] [Stable] 3.202 (Sep 18 2019)
  • [Verified] [Stable] 3.201 (Sep 14 2019)
  • [Verified] [Stable] 3.200 (Sep 13 2019)
  • [Stable RC2] 3.194 (Sep 9 2019)
  • [Stable RC1] 3.187 (Sep 8 2019)
  • [Verified] [Experimental] 3.186 (Aug 23 2019)
  • [Verified] [Experimental] 3.176 (Aug 8 2019)
  • [Verified] [Experimental] 3.173 (Aug 8 2019)
  • [Verified] [Experimental] 3.172-3 (Aug 4 2019)
  • [Experimental] 3.172-2 (Aug 4 2019)
  • [Verified] [Experimental] 3.172 (Aug 3 2019)
  • [Experimental] 3.167 (Jul 24 2019)
  • [Experimental] 3.065-4 (Jun 8 2019)
  • [Experimental] 3.065-3 (Jun 8 2019)
  • [Experimental] 3.065-2 (Jun 8 2019)
  • [Experimental] 3.065 (Jun 6 2019)
  • [Experimental] 3.061 (Jun 6 2019)
  • [Experimental] 3.061 (Jun 5 2019)
  • [Experimental] 2.850 (May 18 2019)
  • [Experimental] 2.825 (May 12 2019)
  • [Experimental] 2.814 (May 11 2019)
  • [Experimental] 2.763 (Apr 23 2019)
  • [Experimental] 2.760 (Apr 19 2019)
  • [Experimental] 2.754 (Apr 8 2019)
  • [Experimental] 2.723-5 (Mar 4 2019)
  • [Experimental] 2.723-4 (Mar 2 2019)
  • [Experimental] 2.723-3 (Mar 2 2019)
  • [Experimental] 2.723-2 (Mar 1 2019)
  • [Experimental] 2.723 (Feb 28 2019)
  • [Experimental] 2.720 (Feb 26 2019)
  • [Experimental] 2.719 (Feb 23 2019)
  • [Experimental] 2.718 (Feb 22 2019)
  • [Experimental] 2.706 (Feb 2 2019)
  • [Experimental] 2.700 (Jan 26 2019)
  • [Experimental] 2.698 (Jan 26 2019)
  • [Experimental] 2.689 (Jan 10 2019)
  • [Experimental] 2.686 (Jan 1 2019)
  • [Experimental] 2.685 (Dec 30 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.671-2 (Dec 23 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.671 (Dec 22 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.670 (Dec 22 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.669-2 (Dec 21 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.669 (Dec 19 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.667 (Dec 18 2018)
  • [Verified] [Stable] 2.641 (Sep 25 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.639-4 (Sep 23 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.639-3 (Sep 23 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.639-2 (Sep 22 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.639 (Sep 22 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.638 (Sep 12 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.636-3 (Sep 10 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.636-2 (Sep 10 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.636 (Sep 9 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.635 (Sep 7 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.634 (Sep 6 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.628 (Sep 4 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.627-2 (Sep 3 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.627 (Sep 3 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.626 'Stitch' (Sep 2 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.625 (Sep 1 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.624 (Aug 31 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.620-3 (Aug 31 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.620-2 (Aug 30 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.620 (Aug 30 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.610 (Aug 28 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.608-2 (Aug 27 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.608 (Aug 27 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.605-2 (Aug 26 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.605 (Aug 25 2018)
  • [Verified] [Stable] 2.600 (Aug 23 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.566-4 (Aug 23 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.566-3 (Aug 22 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.566-2 (Aug 22 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.566 (Aug 22 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.563-6 (Aug 17 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.563-5 (Aug 17 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.563-4 (Aug 16 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.563-3 (Aug 16 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.563-2 (Aug 16 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.563 (Aug 16 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.561-5 (Aug 15 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.561-4 (Aug 15 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.561-3 (Aug 15 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.561-2 (Aug 15 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.561 (Aug 15 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.557-4 (Aug 14 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.557-3 (Aug 14 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.557-2 (Aug 14 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.557 (Aug 14 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.555 (Aug 13 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.553-2 (Aug 13 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.553 (Aug 12 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.551-2 (Aug 11 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.551 (Aug 11 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.550 (Aug 10 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.543 (Aug 7 2018)
  • [Verified] [Experimental] 2.536-5 (Aug 2 2018)
  • [Verified] [Stable] 2.536-4 (Aug 1 2018)
  • [Verified] [Stable] 2.536-3 (Jul 30 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.536-2 (Jul 27 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.536 (Jul 27 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.532 (Jul 24 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.531-3 (Jul 24 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.531-2 (Jul 24 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.531 (Jul 24 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.530-2 (Jul 12 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.530 (Jul 10 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.526 (Jun 27 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.525-2 (Jun 23 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.525 (Jun 21 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.518-3 (Jun 15 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.518-2 (Jun 14 2018)
  • [Experimental] 2.518 (Jun 13 2018, download unavailable)
  • [Experimental] 2.516 (Jun 6 2018)
  • [Verified] [Stable] 2.513 (Jun 1 2018, initial public release)