Missing status bar and misplaced playback bar in Music app

Question

Level 1

20 points

Missing status bar and misplaced playback bar in Music app

Macbook Air, 15-inch, M2, 2023

Tahoe 26.5

Music app

I just updated Mac OS to Tahoe 26.5 only to discover that the status bar has disappeared from the Music app. Not only that but the playback bar is now freefloating at the bottom of the window covering up the playlists. Not elegant and kind of obnoxious. I can find no way to make it relocate to the top of the window where it belongs, or to recover the missing status bar.

Solutions I have found online (including from Apple Support and here in the Community forum), like the one involving a Terminal command, do not work. Has anyone found a way to turn back time on this unfortunate development?

MacBook Air 15″, macOS 26.5

Posted on May 25, 2026 8:29 PM

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Answer 1

May 25, 2026 8:38 PM in response to WuFong

You are correct that the playback bar now resides at the bottom of the window. You also are not the first to express strong dislike for the new location. I invite you to add your voice to the chorus that is providing Feedback to Apple about this design choice.

As for the status bar: if you have enabled View > Show Status Bar in the Music app menu bar, then you can still find the status info at the top of the main window. You may have to scroll the window down (up?) a smidge before the status bar comes out of hiding.

If your main Music window is too tall to require or allow for scrolling, then resize it to be shorter. Now you can find the status bar when it unhides above the artwork.

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Answer 2

WuFong Author

Level 1

20 points

May 25, 2026 8:57 PM in response to D.I. Johnson

Wow, thanks for the quick response! I found the status bar, thank you very much. I have a lot of very long playlists, so I wasn’t scrolling down to the bottom where I could see it. It used to be external to the playlist window, so it was always visible. (And frankly that’s how where it should always be.)

Now it would be nice to figure out how to make this **** floating playback bar go away (back to the top, external to the playlist window where IT too belongs). The Terminal command <defaults write com.apple.Music com.apple.SwiftUI.DisableSolarium -bool YES> that supposedly makes it revert has no effect on my machine.

I will definitely add my remarks to Apple feedback.

Thanks for helping out!

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Answer 3

May 25, 2026 9:22 PM in response to WuFong

You're welcome.

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