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On my iPhone I can use the Control Center to toggle Do Not Disturb on and off whenever I want.

On my Mac I checked in System Preferences > Notifications and I can set it on a schedule, but there’s no option to show a Do Not Disturb icon in the Menu Bar.

How can I easily toggle Do Not Disturb on/off on my Mac without going into System Preferences or having to use Terminal?

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4 Answers 4

Reset to default
54

Option + Click the menu bar

Actually, there is a Menu Bar icon, of sorts.

To toggle Do Not Disturb you can just hold the option key down while you click on the Notification Centre icon at top right of your Menu Bar.

Doing this will instantly make any visible notifications disappear and grey out the icon. You can still click on it to manually show/hide the Notification Centre whenever you want, but Do Not Disturb stays active.

NOTE: Do Not Disturb will stay active until the next day (when it becomes inactive again) or until you once again hold the option key while clicking on the Notification Centre icon.

Keyboard shortcut

You can also create a keyboard shortcut. To do this:

  1. Go to Apple > System Preferences...
  2. Select the Keyboard preference pane
  3. Select the Shortcuts tab
  4. In the left-hand pane select Mission Control
  5. On the right-hand side tick the Turn Do Not Disturb On/Off checkbox
  6. Now press the keys you want to use for your shortcut (e.g. in the screenshot below I've chosen ⇧⌘D)

enter image description here

  1. Exit System Preferences

Now you should be able to use that Keyboard shortcut to toggle Do Not Disturb on/off as required.

NOTE: If a keyboard shortcut you've set up doesn't work, then it's most likely already in use for another purpose within macOS. Likewise, if it doesn't work while you're in a particular app, then it may conflict with an app-specific shortcut. In either case you will need to change your shortcut.

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  • 11
    This is perfect.
    – user344980
    Commented Sep 10, 2019 at 18:43
  • 4
    I never knew about the OPTION-click capability. Drop-down and slide-in yes, but OPTION-click, no. Nice.
    – Christopher Schultz
    Commented Sep 12, 2019 at 16:29
  • I successfully added a keyboard shortcut, but the first one I tried didn't work. Any idea why?
    – TorBro
    Commented Sep 13, 2019 at 21:22
  • @TorBro Thanks for the question/feedback. :) The shortcut must have already been in use. I've added a note to the end of my answer to clarify.
    – Monomeeth ♦
    Commented Sep 13, 2019 at 22:18
  • Please see apple.stackexchange.com/questions/371909/…
    – user344980
    Commented Oct 8, 2019 at 11:19
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Complementing Monomeeth's excellent answer, there's also a toggle button available in the Notification Center in macOS. This is sort of the shortcut (albeit a bit lengthy) you are looking for.

Click on the Notification Center button in the far right on the Menu bar to reveal the Notification Center UI.

Now with the Today tab selected, scroll down to reveal the Do Not Disturb toggle.

Additionally, if you have Hey Siri enabled, you can simply ask Siri to toggle Do Not Disturb.

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  • 8
    Great info, but I imagine that talking out loud to your computer to put it in DND mode isn't something that gets a lot of use!
    – JPhi1618
    Commented Sep 10, 2019 at 19:03
  • 7
    "scroll down to reveal the Do Not Disturb toggle": I would describe it as scrolling up (by dragging/swiping down), though it is ambiguous! :)
    – Miles
    Commented Sep 11, 2019 at 2:36
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As well as the answers given, if your Mac has a Touch Bar, you can customise it to include a toggle for Do Not Disturb in the Control Strip which is (nearly) always visible. Of course, you'll have to give up one of the other functions from the Control Strip -- the defaults are brightness, volume, mute and Siri.

Screenshot of Touch Bar customization pane with the Do Not Disturb option hand circled in red.

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  • After using this toggle, I get the menu bar icon, but as soon as I disable it, it will be gone. It would be nice to always have the menu bar icon.
    – Martin Braun
    Commented Dec 15, 2020 at 0:26
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If you have a trackpad, and you want to enter "Do Not Disturb" mode with gestures, then go to System Preferences->Trackpad->More Gestures and turn on "Notification Centre".

Trackpad panel in System Preferences

Now you can swipe to the left with two fingers from the edge of the trackpad to open the Notification Center. Now swipe down with two fingers to reveal the Do Not Disturb switch.

Do Not Disturb switch in Notification Center

If you like gestures, then this is the way to go!

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