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I removed the Spotlight icon from the menu bar. I would like to restore it.

I tried the recommended method: 

sudo mdutil -a -i on
sudo chmod 755 /System/Library/CoreServices/Search.bundle/Contents/MacOS/Search
sudo killall SystemUIServer

…which did not help. The command keys still work, but I would like to see the icon. I read the suggestion to reinstall the system and would prefer not to do that.

Does anyone have a different suggestion?

Problem solved: The article from OSXDaily worked perfectly. Thanks to all who responded.

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  • 4
    How did you remove it?
    – Gordon Davisson
    Oct 13, 2013 at 3:13
  • 2
    Did you do a system restart after running the commands above?
    – Deesbek
    Oct 13, 2013 at 3:18
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    As mentioned in this article on osxdaily [see below], the user hid it by using sudo chmod 600 /System/Library/CoreServices/Search.bundle/Contents/MacOS/Search followed by killall SystemUIServer Link to article:osxdaily.com/2011/12/12/hide-spotlight-menu-icon-mac-os-x
    – M K
    Oct 13, 2013 at 17:00

1 Answer 1

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Just to make an official answer.

User M K referenced an article in osXDaily that explains how to both hide and un-hide the Spotlight icon.

Show the Spotlight Menu Again

Getting the Spotlight icon back is a matter of bringing the permissions back to their default setting in OS X. Go back to the Terminal app by relaunching it from /Applications/Utilities/, and then enter the exact command syntax below: sudo chmod 755 /System/Library/CoreServices/Search.bundle/Contents/MacOS/Search

Hit the return key, then follow this up with killing the SystemUIServer process again: killall SystemUIServer The system menu bar will refresh, and the Spotlight menu will be visible again.

I just tested this on OS X Yosemite 10.10.5 with success.

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