New Control Center

In this video, we’re going to look at the Control Center on the Mac; Apple introduced a new Control Center with macOS big Sur. With the control center, we can adjust our display, brightness, our sound levels. We can turn on, do not disturb. We can adjust our keyboard brightness. We can even customize this Control Center. Let’s take a look at this new Control Center that Apple introduced to the Mac’s macOS Big Sur. Let’s go to my Mac.

Now, as I mentioned in the introduction, this Control Center was introduced with macOS Big Sur. So if you’re using an earlier version of macOS, you will not have access to this Control Center.

So I’m using macOS Big Sur. So what is this Control Center that I’m talking about? Well, if you’re familiar with an iPad or an iPhone, you know that you have easy access to various controls, such as your display brightness. We have the same options now with our Mac; if we go up to our menu bar in the upper right-hand corner, you’re going to see we have this new icon here.

This is the Control Center. When I click on it, I have access to various controls. I want to change my wifi settings. I click on wifi here, and now I can change my wifi settings. I can switch to a different network. Let’s go back up to our control center. I want to adjust my display brightness. I slide this to the left or right to change the brightness.

Same thing with the sound I want to turn on. Do not disturb. I click on this. And now what I can do is I can turn on, do not disturb for a preset time. So to access our control center, we go up to the upper right-hand corner and click on the Control Center here. Now we can customize these controls in the Control Center.

In other words, what we’re able to do is move some of these controls outside of the Control Center and into our menu bar and move some of these from our menu bar. In to our Control Center here, so he can customize it. So we have limited customization options, but we can customize it to customize a Control Center and our menu bar here.

What we do is we go over to our System Preferences. So now, what I do is I go up to the Apple menu, and then I go over to System Preferences. What we need to do is we need to go to our Dock and Menu Bar preference pane. I select it, and then over on the left, you’re going to see, we have Control Center underneath control center.

We have all of our different controls. Now I mentioned that we can customize some of these controls. If I were to take a look at wifi here, you’re going to see. It tells me that wifi is always available and the Control Center. So I can’t remove it from the Control Center, but what I can do is I can remove it from the menu bar right now.

It is in the menu bar because this is selected. So if we go up to my menu bar, you’re going to see, I have my wifi here. If I want to remove this from my menu bar, all I have to do is de-select this. And it is no longer in my menu bar, but it still is in. My Control Center, because it’s always available in the Control Center.

Let’s take a look at another one. I’m going to turn this back on. Let’s go over to do not disturb. I select it. We can now see that it is in the Control Center, but it is not in my menu bar.

If I use do not disturb a lot, I may want to move it to my menu bar. All I have to do is select this. And now we can see, we have, do not disturb in my menu bar. I’m going to de-select it. I want to remove it from my menu bar. When I swipe up, you’re going to see; I have other modules with these modules. What I’m able to do is add and remove them from my control center and my menu bar.

Let’s go to fast user switching. If you have multiple users on your Mac. What you can do is you can add this in the menu bar and in the Control Center. If I were to select both of these, it would show up in my menu bar and the control center; let’s go and add it to the Control Center. I click on it. And now, when I go to my control center, you’re going to see a have fast user switching.

Again. If I were to click on show in the menu bar, it also would show in the menu bar. I’m going to de-select this. And then I also have menu bar only options. So these are not in the control center. So for spotlight here, you’re going to see it. It says show in the menu bar, but does not have anything to do with the Control Center.

So all I can do is take this out of the menu bar. I can not add it to my Control Center. Same thing with Siri and time machine. I click on time machine. I can show it in the menu bar, but it can not add to my Control Center. So that’s how we access our Control Center on the Mac. This was introduced in macOS Big Sur.

So if you’re using an earlier operating system, such as macOS Mojave or macOS Catalina, you will not be able to access the Control Center. To access the Control Center, you go up to the menu bar, see an icon for the Control Center, click on it, and see all of the different controls available to you to customize it. You go to your System Preferences, and then you go to Dock and Menu Mar.

So that’s a look at the Control Center on the Mac.