Can't Live Without The Touch Bar – Please Bring it Back 🙏🏻

Ever since I bought a MacBook Pro with touch bar in 2017, it has become an essential part of the way I use my laptop. I'm a hardcore advocate of keyboard shortcuts, but still there are many times they cannot replace the Touch Bar.

Here are just 4 examples of features I use every day that are difficult or impossible to replace with the new generation MacBook Pros:

1) Display of align options when selecting objects in Keynote, Sketch etc

Creating & learning 8 keyboard shortcuts for the align controls is not workable.

2) Displaying all slides in a presentation when in presentation mode allowing you to easily jump around

I regularly give presentations with sometimes hundreds of slides and frequently need to jump around, especially during the Q&A section. The alternatives are repeatedly pressing the arrow keys (and going through each animation step) or fiddling around with the mouse on screen to locate the slide.

3) Changing color of text in emails

Whenever adding comments to an email in a different color, this makes changing the color of text so much quicker. Copy format (⌥ + ⌘ + C) and Paste format (⌥ + ⌘ + V) are a poor alternative.

4) Recently used emoji

Again there is a keyboard shortcut (⌃ + ⌘ + ␣), but it's just not as quick.

5) Simple System Controls

Being able to instantly switch on 'Do Not Disturb' during a video call or mute, plus seeing the current status on directly on the button on the touch bar.

I rely on the touch bar so heavily that when my 2017 MacBook Pro died I bought the very last MacBook Pro to to feature a Touch Bar the 2023 13" M2 MacBook Pro.

I really hope Apple brings this back or possibly something even more powerful. Perhaps similar to Art Lebedev Studio's 2011 Optimus Popularis. Having all keys update contextually would be game changing.