SwiftBar Plugin Development

Build and maintain SwiftBar menu bar plugins for macOS. SwiftBar executes scripts in a designated Plugin Folder and parses their stdout into menu bar items and dropdown menus.

Languages: Bash for simple plugins, Python for anything involving APIs, JSON parsing, or complex logic. Choose based on complexity — don't use Python when 10 lines of bash would do.

Plugin Folder

Ask the user where their SwiftBar Plugin Folder is located if you don't know. Common locations:

• ~/SwiftBar/ or ~/swiftbar/
• ~/Library/SwiftBar/
• Custom path set in SwiftBar preferences

Once known, install plugins directly there so the user sees results immediately.

File Naming

{name}.{interval}.{ext}