I’ve been experimenting with different ways to reduce the friction in accessing my most-used links, and I recently discovered LinkNotch, which takes an approach I hadn’t considered before. It uses the MacBook notch as an interactive element for organizing and accessing your frequently visited websites.
The concept is straightforward. You hover over or click the notch area on your MacBook, and a panel drops down displaying your saved links organized by categories. The app comes with default categories like Work and General, making it easy to separate your professional bookmarks from personal ones. Each link appears with its favicon and domain name, so you can quickly identify what you’re looking for without reading full URLs.
What I appreciate about LinkNotch is how it leverages a piece of hardware that’s otherwise just taking up screen space. MacBooks with notches have this prominent feature that most apps ignore, but LinkNotch turns it into functional interface real estate. The panel itself has a clean black background with white text, and while it’s not the most visually elaborate design, it gets the job done without getting in the way.
In my usage over the past week, the app has been particularly useful for work-related links I access multiple times per day. Instead of digging through browser bookmarks or typing partial URLs into the address bar, I just tap the notch and click the link I need. The app shows common macOS apps in a dock-like interface at the bottom of the panel, which adds another layer of quick access functionality.
The app is available on the Mac App Store (free with in-app purchases for premium features), and it requires a MacBook with a notch, obviously limiting its compatibility to newer models like the 14-inch and 16-inch MacBook Pro, or the M2 MacBook Air and later. Performance has been solid on my M2 MacBook Air, with no noticeable impact on system resources.
One limitation I’ve noticed is that the panel doesn’t support nested categories or folders, so if you have dozens of links, organization might become challenging. The app also requires you to manually add each link rather than importing from browser bookmarks, which takes some initial setup time.
For anyone with a newer MacBook who frequently accesses the same set of websites throughout the day, LinkNotch offers a clever solution that turns an underutilized design element into a productivity tool. It won’t replace a full bookmark manager, but it provides fast access to your most important links without cluttering your menu bar or dock.
