Enable iTunes taskbar player

Jul 14th, 2007 by Jared Schwager itunes, taskbar

iTunes taskbar player
If you’ve used Windows Media Player before you may have noticed that when you minimize it, a mini-player in your Windows taskbar will appear. Believe it or not, the same functionality exists in iTunes. I’ll show you how to enable the taskbar player for iTunes.

Firstly, open up the iTunes Preferences under the “Edit” menu. In the preferences window that appears go to the “Advanced” tab. Find the option Minimize iTunes window to system tray and make sure it is unchecked.

Make your way down to the Windows taskbar. Right-click the taskbar, go to “Toolbars” and click on iTunes. Now whenever you minimize iTunes the taskbar player will appear, giving you limited control of your music without having to maximize iTunes.

NOTE: Using the iTunes taskbar player in Windows Vista will disable the taskbar transparency.

25 reader comments

July 16th, 2007 at 10:05 am Luke says:

Fantastic. Thank you.
August 11th, 2007 at 7:21 am Nathan says:

Doesn’t seem to work in most recent build of Vista, home premium, the itunes option isn;t in the ‘toolbars’.
August 11th, 2007 at 10:58 am Jared Schwager says:

Nathan, that’s odd. I am using Vista and even took the screenshot from in Vista. Try setting the compatibility setting for iTunes to Windows XP SP2.
August 31st, 2007 at 9:16 am sarah says:

Perfect, just the trick I was after. Thanks!
September 1st, 2007 at 10:19 am Adam says:

Thank you for sharing this excellent piece of knowledge. I was surprised this would need no 3rd party software and it makes using iTunes so much easier!
September 21st, 2007 at 2:17 pm spokexx says:

Ok, i know how to minimize it but ive seen some placers where the miniplayer in the taskbar shows the current song playing. Now, ive got my miniplayer in the taskbar but im not seeing the current song playing. So how do i get that?
September 21st, 2007 at 2:46 pm Jared Schwager says:

spokexx, as far as I know, the iTunes taskbar player isn’t capable of displaying the currently playing song title. I’d love it if you could send me one of those screenshots of the taskbar player with the currently playing song title.
October 12th, 2007 at 4:13 pm spokexx says:

Hey Jared. I THINK i remember seeing that mini-player with the song displayed on an old iMac with an early version of iTunes. Maybe this feature has been removed, but i swaer i used to see the mini-player in the taskbar with controls and all, and it would show the currently playing song scrolling across it.
September 25th, 2008 at 4:50 pm steve says:

spokexx i know that if u slide your mouse over the itunes icon in the system tray it will tell you that info, but i dont think you can do it with the mini-player
November 12th, 2008 at 12:25 pm Frank says:

I, too, remember the old iTunes version that had the song title scrolling in the taskbar. It must have been removed a few releases ago though, as I have been searching (fruitlessly) for that feature setting ever since. It’s probably been a couple years since I remember seeing it. I actually found this post while looking for it. Which, by the way, thanks! I also wanted to enable taskbar control, so this helped me solve that problem as well! Oh, I too am running the latest Vista with this enabled with no problems.
January 5th, 2009 at 2:49 pm Jonnski says:

Cheers for that mate, was very helpful! i used to use it on my old pc and i just could not remember how i set it up for life of me!!!

Thanks x
February 19th, 2009 at 1:24 am Chris says:

Ahh, such a simple answer to something thats bothered me for months now!
March 14th, 2009 at 3:19 pm Tyler says:

How do you change compatibility to XP?
June 11th, 2009 at 3:40 am syaa says:

thank you so much!
June 24th, 2009 at 5:46 pm Chrissy says:

If you click on the triangle in the lower right corner of the taskbar player, a menu appears showing the name and artist of the current song in gray. It would be nice if it would automatically displayed this information, but I guess that’s the closest you can get without having to maximize the player.
July 19th, 2009 at 3:09 am norami says:

this what i was looking for
Thanks very much
perfect
August 5th, 2009 at 10:00 am tom says:

i have i tunes installed on a flashdrive to save space onmy rather slow aspire 1350 series, in the tool bar drop box there is not an option for i tunes does any one know a way to have it there with out installing i tunes on my laptop.
September 12th, 2009 at 11:16 pm Samantha says:

I have just downloaded iTunes 9 and have lost all control of my iTunes when it is in my taskbar. I can see it, but i can’t push any off the buttons, and its now a waste of space. Help i want it back.
September 16th, 2009 at 8:17 pm natalie says:

ty so much id been wracking m brains trying to remember how to do that. much appreciated
September 18th, 2009 at 5:41 pm vin says:

dude thanks this is great
September 20th, 2009 at 10:07 pm Kai Zen says:

I know MediaMonkey has the feature to automatically display the song details whenever a new song is played. I was wondering if this feature was hidden somewhere in iTunes but i guess not.
October 24th, 2009 at 9:51 pm ricky says:

i too remember a time when the “taskbar itunes” would scroll song info, and i wish they would bring it back. in fact, it would be so easy to program! just make the whole thing a touch wider, switch the volume slider from horizontal to vertical, then use the new space for the info window. i wonder why they removed it in the first place.
October 31st, 2009 at 8:20 am Dobbyn says:

Thanks alot lol, the first site i’ve come across that actually is very easy to understand and is what everyone needs!!!

THANKS!
November 22nd, 2009 at 6:12 pm Drew says:

ROCK ON! This was annoying the heck out of me for so long…
January 11th, 2010 at 2:28 pm Fraser says:

Thank god. Now I know how to get the mini-player OUT of the taskbar. I’m a ALT-TABer , and when itunes is in the tray, it can’t be tabb’d to.