The Typographical Tools Overlay
macOS includes powerful built-in accessibility and typographical tools designed for users who need to type in multiple languages, insert complex mathematical symbols, or frequently use emojis. To make these tools easily accessible, macOS offers the ability to place a “Keyboard and Emoji Viewers” icon directly in the top Menu Bar. When clicked, this icon drops down a menu allowing you to instantly launch a virtual, on-screen keyboard (useful if a physical key is broken) or a floating panel containing every available emoji and special character.
While this is incredibly useful for linguists or heavy social media users, it is often redundant for standard users. The Emoji viewer can already be summoned instantly in almost any application by pressing the keyboard shortcut Control + Command + Space. Similarly, if you never use the on-screen virtual keyboard, having a dedicated icon permanently sitting in your Menu Bar just wastes valuable screen real estate, especially on smaller MacBook displays. If you prefer to launch these tools via keyboard shortcuts, you should remove the Menu Bar icon.
How to Remove the Keyboard and Emoji Viewers Icon
You can hide this specific input menu icon via the Keyboard settings.
- Click the Apple Logo in the top-left corner of the screen and select System Settings… (or System Preferences).
- In the left-hand sidebar, scroll down and click on Keyboard.
- In the right-hand pane, look under the “Text Input” section for the Edit… button next to “Input Sources” and click it. (On older macOS versions, just look for the “Input Sources” tab).
- Look for the toggle switch (or checkbox) labelled Show Input menu in menu bar.
- Click the toggle switch to turn it Off (or uncheck the box).
The icon (which typically looks like a small flag or a keyboard symbol) will immediately disappear from your top Menu Bar, decluttering your interface.