Glossary · also: camera housing
Notch
The cutout at the top of modern MacBook displays that holds the camera.
What it means
Since 2021, MacBook Pro displays (and later Airs) carry a rounded cutout at the top-center of the screen where the camera lives. macOS renders the menu bar around it, and the pixels inside the cutout simply do not exist. Apple’s own iPhone software turned the same idea — the Dynamic Island — into an interface.
Why it matters
The notch is a permanently reserved strip of otherwise dead screen. It is always visible on every space, at every zoom level, in every app. That makes it the most reliable piece of attention real estate on a Mac — if something can live there without shouting.
How notchos does it
notchos treats the notch as a home address: a quiet pill rests inside it, and hovering springs a tool panel out of it. On Macs without the hardware, it draws a simulated pill instead, so the idea is not gated on the purchase year of your laptop.
Fair questions
- Is the notch a touchscreen thing?
- No — on the Mac it is purely a display cutout with the camera behind it. Anything interactive there is software drawn around it.
- Can the notch show notifications?
- Not system notifications — macOS reserves those for the top-right corner. Notch apps draw their own content in the reserved space instead.
Related terms
Twenty tools. One hover. $9.99, once.