NotchNook Gives MacBooks Their Own Dynamic Island

Much like the Live Island, NotchNook extends beyond the notch, revealing a “Nook” with basic media controls (much like Live Activities in iOS) and other customizable widgets. Then there’s a “Tray” tab where you can drop files or apps; it’s similar to the macOS dock, except the tray empties when you exit NotchNook.

You can access it by clicking a tab that fades into the notch, or by swiping down on your touchpad when your mouse cursor is over it. You can also set it to automatically unfold when you hover over it.

NotchNook works on Macs with and without notches. For those without one, you can customize it to look like a full notch or just appear as a small black sliver in the top center of your screen. The app lists other “coming soon” features, like the ability to zip or unzip files by dragging them into the app (which sounds funny and pointless, but that’s the impression this app gives me anyway).

The app could still be improved: I couldn’t figure out how to remove files from the Tray tab, which becomes the default tab once you put something there. Also, swiping left or right is supposed to be like tapping the next or previous song button, but that didn’t work for me. And it seems like the app only supports certain media apps, like Apple Music, as controls didn’t show up for other apps I tried. I also couldn’t find a privacy policy for Lo.cafe, and the developer didn’t respond to my questions at the time of publication.

But those issues aside, NotchNook feels like a very natural extension of macOS. I don’t feel like it’s doing anything I can’t already do without it, which is good because it’s just plain fun to use.