Support

This support page is a work-in-progress. If you have any questions, please just email me.

— Dax

Getting Started

Installation

Dock Party is available on the Mac App Store. It requires macOS 15 Sequoia or later and is optimized for macOS 26 Tahoe.

First Launch

When you first open Dock Party, macOS will ask you to grant Automation access. This is required for Dock Party to communicate with Spotify and Apple Music. Without it, none of the music features will work. You can manage this later in System Settings → Privacy & Security → Automation.

Dock Party runs as a menu bar app — there is no Dock icon by default. Look for the music note icon (♫) in your menu bar. Click it to open the status bar popover with player controls, album art, and track info. Right-click it for quick access to Settings, About, and Quit.

Where Are the Controls?

Dock Party's main interface lives directly beside your Dock. If your Dock is visible, Dock Party is visible. You'll see player controls, track details, and album art flanking the Dock. These are always accessible without switching apps or clicking anything — just glance down.

If you don't see anything next to your Dock, make sure music is playing in Spotify or Apple Music, and make sure the Dock itself is visible (not hidden).

Music Features

Supported Players

Dock Party works with the Spotify desktop app and the Apple Music desktop app. It does not work with web players, Spotify running inside a browser, or any other music apps. Both players can be installed simultaneously — Dock Party will automatically detect whichever one is actively playing.

Player Controls

The player controls panel appears on one side of the Dock and provides play/pause, skip forward, skip back, shuffle, and repeat buttons. You can also control volume with the volume slider. All of these controls work without stealing focus from whatever app you're currently using.

You can swap which side of the Dock the controls appear on in Settings → Dock.

Track Details and Album Art

The other side of the Dock displays the currently playing song title, artist, and album name, along with the album cover art. Click the album art to bring the active music player to the foreground.

Like Button

The ♥️ button adds the currently playing track to your Liked Songs in Spotify or your library in Apple Music.

Progress Bar

A track progress bar runs along the upper edge of the Dock, showing elapsed time, remaining time, and a clickable/draggable scrubber. It includes its own mini player controls at either end. The progress bar is one of the most useful features for keeping track of where you are in a song without switching apps.

Connecting to Spotify

Dock Party connects to the Spotify desktop app automatically via macOS Automation for playback control and track info. No separate Spotify login is required for basic features.

To enable the Like button and deeper Spotify integration, go to Settings → Spotify and sign in with your Spotify account. This uses a secure OAuth flow — Dock Party never sees your Spotify password.

Search Buttons

In the status bar popover, you'll find buttons to search for the current song or artist on DuckDuckGo, YouTube, Genius Lyrics, Ultimate Guitar Tabs, and BandsInTown.

Visualizers and Dock Themes

Audio Visualizers

Dock Party offers three music visualizers that animate directly inside the Dock area:

Amplitude — A single expanding bar that pulses with the volume of the music, with smooth hue cycling
Pitch — Responds to the dominant pitch of the music with colored stripes and an amplitude-driven background
Waveform — A 32-bar frequency spectrum display, like a classic graphic equalizer

These visualizers use Core Audio process taps to read audio directly from the Spotify or Apple Music process. This means they work with headphones, don't require microphone access, and aren't affected by ambient noise.

Dock Background Animations

In addition to visualizers, you can apply a background color theme to the Dock area:

Neon — Colorful bars with staggered opacity animations
KITT — A red gradient sweep, Knight Rider style
Emergency — Alternating red and blue bars

You can also choose from a variety of solid colors, gradients, and color cycling options. All of these are configurable in Settings → Dock.

Track Progress in the Dock

A separate option fills the Dock area with color proportional to the track's progress. This can fill horizontally or vertically, and you can enable color cycling for an extra dynamic effect.

Scrolling Marquee

Display the song title, artist name, album name, or a custom message as scrolling text inside the Dock area. Font, size, color, and scroll speed are all configurable.

Menu Bar

Status Bar Display

Dock Party can display the currently playing song title, artist, and album in the macOS menu bar. This is useful if you keep your Dock hidden or want track info visible at all times. You can customize which fields to show and the text size in Settings → Status Bar.

Status Bar Popover

Click the Dock Party icon (♫) in the menu bar to open a popover window with large album art, player controls, track info, a progress bar, and search buttons. This popover can be detached and dragged anywhere on screen, and optionally kept open while you work in other apps.

Dock Pics

Dock Pics is Dock Party's built-in photo and music sharing service. Share photos, Spotify and Apple Music tracks, and webpage links with your buddies — and see them appear in the Pic Parade, a unique horizontal stream that expands the Dock area with your shared content.

Creating an Account

To use Dock Pics, you need a free account. Go to Settings → Dock Pics and sign in with Apple or create an account with email and password. You can also sign up on the web.

If you sign up with email, you'll receive a confirmation email. Click the link to verify your address, then return to Dock Party and sign in.

The Pic Parade

The Pic Parade is the horizontal scrolling view that appears above the Dock area. It displays your received and sent Dock Pics in a continuous stream, with the newest pics on the left. The Parade integrates with Dock Party's visualizers and background themes — your music and your pics share the same space.

You can toggle the Pic Parade visibility with the floating button near the Dock, or from the Dock Party menu. When the Parade is hidden, Dock Party's music features continue to work normally.

Sending a Dock Pic

The console bar at the bottom of the Pic Parade is where you send Dock Pics. Select a recipient from the "To:" dropdown, then choose a photo from the Photos button or drag and drop an image directly onto the send area. You can also paste an image from the clipboard.

To share the track you're currently listening to, click the Spotify or Apple Music button in the console. The recipient will see the track's album art and can click to listen.

To share a webpage, click the link button and paste a URL. The recipient will see a preview thumbnail of the page.

Receiving Dock Pics

When a buddy sends you a Dock Pic, it appears in your Pic Parade. Soft-mode pics appear quietly. Hard-mode pics force the Parade open and keep it visible briefly to make sure you see them — configurable per buddy in their contact card.

Big Pic View

Click any pic in the Parade to open it in the Big Pic viewer. Navigate between pics with the left and right arrow keys. Press Escape or ⌘W to close.

Pic Options

Right-click a pic in the Parade or Big Pic view for options including:

Save — Save the full-resolution original to a location of your choice
Set as Wallpaper — Set the pic as your Desktop wallpaper
Reply — Loads the pic into the send area, pre-addressed to the sender
Trophy — Mark a pic as a winner (🏆). Trophied pics can be filtered in the Parade toolbar
Hide — Hide a pic from the Parade without deleting it
Delete Permanently — Remove a pic forever. The image is only deleted from storage when both the sender and recipient have deleted it

Blur Settings

You can blur all incoming Dock Pics by default using the global blur toggle in the Parade toolbar. You can also set per-buddy blur in each buddy's contact card. Double-click any individual pic to override the blur setting for that specific pic — this preference is saved permanently.

Image Quality

Dock Pics preserves your photos at much higher quality than most social media services. Originals are stored at full resolution. The Parade displays optimized thumbnails for smooth scrolling performance, and the Big Pic view loads a high-resolution version for detail.

Buddies

Dock Pics uses a buddy system. You can only send and receive pics with people you're connected to. No strangers, no spam, no algorithms.

Adding Buddies

Open the Buddies window from the buddies button in the Pic Parade console, or from the Dock Party menu. Click the + button in the toolbar to send a buddy request. Enter the person's email address and their name, and they'll receive your request.

If the person already has a Dock Pics account, the request appears in their Received Requests. If they don't have an account yet, they'll receive an email invitation, and the request will be fulfilled automatically when they sign up.

Responding to Requests

Incoming buddy requests appear in the Received Requests section of the Buddies sidebar. You can accept or decline each request.

Buddy Contact Cards

Each buddy has a contact card where you can:

Set a nickname that appears in your buddy list and the "To:" dropdown
Mark them as an All-Star (⭐) — All-Stars are listed at the top of the buddy list
Set a custom profile pic that only you see — choose from the bundled Dock Party avatars, your Photos library, or any image file
Enable blur for all pics from this buddy
Set their delivery mode — Soft (pics arrive quietly) or Hard (Parade opens to show the pic)

Your Card

Your own "Me" card appears at the top of the Buddies sidebar. Here you can edit your display name, choose your profile pic, and see the email address associated with your account.

Settings

Access Settings from the right-click menu on the Dock Party icon in the menu bar, or from the Dock Party menu. Settings are organized into tabs:

Dock — Visualizer selection, Dock background color/animation, track progress in Dock, scrolling marquee, control panel layout, album art options, rounded Desktop corners
Dock Pics — Sign in or create a Dock Pics account, manage your session
Status Bar — Menu bar track info display options and text size
Spotify — Connect your Spotify account for Like button functionality
General — Launch at login, show Dock icon, keep window on top, and other general preferences

Requirements and Compatibility

macOS 15 Sequoia or later (optimized for macOS 26 Tahoe)
Spotify desktop app and/or Apple Music desktop app
Dock must be positioned at the bottom of the screen for most features. If your Dock is on the side — well, you do you, but most of Dock Party's interface won't be visible
Automation permission must be granted for Spotify and/or Apple Music

Features that work with the Dock hidden: Dock Pics and the Pic Parade, the progress bar and mini controls, and all menu bar functions.

Privacy

Dock Party does not serve ads and collects minimal data. See the full Privacy Policy for details.

Dock Pics accounts store only what's necessary to deliver the service: your email, display name, profile pic, buddy connections, and the pics you send and receive. Dock Party does not analyze, sell, or share your photos or personal data with anyone.

Music features use Automation (AppleScript) to communicate with Spotify and Apple Music locally on your Mac.

Dock Tips

I don't see anything next to my Dock

Make sure Spotify or Apple Music is open and playing a track
Make sure your Dock is positioned at the bottom of the screen (not the side)
Make sure the Dock itself is visible (not auto-hidden)
Check that Dock Party has Automation access in System Settings → Privacy & Security → Automation
Try quitting and relaunching Dock Party

The visualizers aren't responding to music

Make sure a visualizer is enabled in Settings → Dock
Visualizers require the Spotify or Apple Music desktop app. Web players are not supported
If you just launched Spotify after Dock Party was already running, try pausing and resuming playback
Visualizers may not work on secondary macOS user accounts — this is a known limitation of Core Audio process taps

I can't find Dock Party — where is it?

Dock Party runs as a menu bar app. Look for the music note (♫) in the menu bar at the top-right of your screen. There is no Dock icon by default. If you'd like a Dock icon, you can enable one in Settings → General.

Can I use Dock Party with my Dock on the side?

Most of Dock Party's interface is designed for a bottom-positioned Dock. If your Dock is on the left or right side of the screen, the player controls, track details, visualizers, and Dock backgrounds won't be visible. However, the menu bar features, progress bar, and Dock Pics still work.

Music pauses or audio quality drops when I open Dock Party

This was an issue in older versions that used microphone input. Dock Party 3.0 and later use Core Audio process taps instead, which don't affect audio quality or trigger "call mode" on Bluetooth devices. If you're experiencing this, make sure you're running the latest version.

My buddy sent me a request but I don't see it

Open the Buddies window and check the Received Requests section in the sidebar
Make sure you're signed in to the same account that the request was sent to
If the request was sent before you created your account, it should be fulfilled automatically the first time you sign in. If it doesn't appear, ask your buddy to resend the request

If you previously created an account with email and password using the same email address as your Apple ID, those accounts may conflict. Try signing in with your email and password instead, or contact support@dockparty.app for help merging accounts.

I signed up but never received a confirmation email

Check your spam or junk folder
The email comes from adminstuff@pics.dockparty.app — make sure it's not being filtered
Try signing up again with the same email. If the account already exists, you'll be told
Sign in with Apple doesn't require email confirmation — consider using that instead

How do I change my profile pic?

Open the Buddies window and select your "Me" card at the top of the sidebar. Click your current profile pic to choose a new one from the bundled Dock Party avatars, your Photos library, or any image file on your Mac.

Can other people see the nickname or custom pic I set for them?

No. Nicknames and custom profile pics are private to your account. Your buddy will never know what you've named them — or what photo you've chosen to represent them.

How do I unblur a pic?

Double-click a blurred pic to permanently unblur it. Double-click again to re-blur. This per-pic override persists across sessions and takes priority over both the global blur setting and the per-buddy blur setting.

What's the difference between Soft and Hard delivery?

Soft means pics arrive quietly — they appear in your Parade the next time you look. Hard means the Parade will open automatically to make sure you see the pic right away. You can set a default mode for each buddy in their contact card.

Is there a limit to how many pics I can send?

You can send up to 50 Dock Pics per day. Individual uploads are capped at 15 MB. If you're running into these limits regularly, you probably have the best Dock on the block.

Can I use Dock Pics without the music features?

Yes. Dock Pics works independently of the music features. You don't need Spotify or Apple Music installed to send and receive photos. The Pic Parade will display your shared content even without music playing — though it's more fun with the visualizers on.

How do I quit Dock Party?

Right-click the Dock Party icon (♫) in the menu bar and select Quit. You can also quit from the Dock Party menu if you've enabled the Dock icon in Settings.