Enable iTunes taskbar player
Jul 14th, 2007 by Jared Schwager
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.
Fantastic. Thank you.
Doesn’t seem to work in most recent build of Vista, home premium, the itunes option isn;t in the ‘toolbars’.
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.
Perfect, just the trick I was after. Thanks!
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!
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?
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.
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.