Missing Launchpad in macOS Tahoe

Typing 'App' doesn't even bring up the App Store, nor does 'Messages' bring up Messages !! The thing is broken and no matter how you want to spin it, the simple launching of an application now involves extra steps for which there is zero benefit.

[Edited by Moderator]

I would strongly suggest not updating at this point.

I'm a 35-year computer user and have been using macOS as a daily driver for the last 5, and my career experience would put me in the top 0.1% of the tech industry -- and this particular change has ME frustrated and has diminished my productivity significantly.

This is not me being "change-resistant"; it's literally erased a function that EVERY desktop interface (Windows, Linux[both gnome and KDE] and all prior versions of MacOS in the last 5 years have) -- the ability to click on a "start|launchpad|etc" button and start typing the name of an application, and have that application come up within 3 characters.

This is a universally-accepted UI feature that everyone who's used a computer within the last 15 years has come to know, and this force to spotlight (which literally nobody finds useful) has eliminated it.

The lack of Launchpad in macOS Tahoe is a real pain. The Launchpad substitution is ridiculous. No alternative can replace this feature: not the Applications folder, not the Dock, not the Spotlight.

Dear Apple management and macOS engineering team, please bring Launchpad back to Tahoe. It has been an integral part of the Mac ecosystem for 14 years.

I want the folders back, which I had in the good old Launchpad before macOS Tahoe. I used to arrange my apps in folders to bring order in my apps, because I have really installed a lot of apps on my Mac. Please Apple, bring back the folders in the Launchpad ... 😢

Apart from that I totally love macOS Tahoe ... 💛

How do you organize apps into specific locations and remove or hide unwanted apps?

I'm seeing a flood of apps and utilities that make it very difficult to find the app I'm trying to launch. Having relied on visual cues for 10? 15? years, I rarely know what the name of an app is. I know where it's located in the LaunchPad and what the icon looks like. This made it a mindless event to launch an app. Now it's far less efficient - what used to take less than one second now takes substantially longer, even a minute in some cases.

ImaGG2 wrote:

IdrisSeabright wrote:

Apple doesn't read here for feedback or suggestions.

Do you know WHY Apple doesn't read here?

Is there any 'connection' between MacRumors and the ASC forums?

Answers are provided by other community users just like you. 

Which implies, Apple Itself is not here

Exception being, the Apple Moderation Team which are Apple Employees who moderate the forums and to make sure we ALL abide by >>

Apple Support Communities Use Agreement

MacRumours and ASC forums are two entirely different entities

ASC Forums are Hosted By Apple making them Owned and Operated by Apple

Where as MacRumours is not

This new way to launch apps is totally not Apple. I had no warning, and now when I click the new apps button, all the apps I have on my phone as well as on my Mac are intermingled. This kills my productivity as now I have to either search for the app I need or scroll through an endless list of apps that I use on my phone now on my Mac. After almost 20 years of using Macs, I am rethinking my setup and may move back to a PC.

[Edited by Moderator]

ImaGG2 wrote:

Do you know WHY Apple doesn't read here?

Because it's a firehose of complaints, legitimate questions, utter nonsense and "me too!" posts. Apple has provided a feedback page. Use it.

Is there any 'connection' between MacRumors and the ASC forums?

No.

Astoriaguy76 wrote:

This new way to launch apps is totally not Apple.

That's what people said about LaunchPad when it first came out.

After almost 20 years of using Macs, I am rethinking my setup and may move back to a PC.

So, for the first six years you used a Mac, you didn't have LaunchPad.

Astoriaguy76 wrote:

This new way to launch apps is totally not Apple. I had no warning, and now when I click the new apps button, all the apps I have on my phone as well as on my Mac are intermingled. This kills my productivity as now I have to either search for the app I need or scroll through an endless list of apps that I use on my phone now on my Mac. After almost 20 years of using Macs, I am rethinking my setup and may move back to a PC.

[Edited by Moderator]

Threats to leave the platform provide endless entertainment and humor here.

You've really missed the point.

Yes, LaunchPad can be accessed those ways but there are other methods to access it that are easier, faster, and more intuitive using gestures.

MOREOVER, the point is that you can curate, filter, order, configure, massage the interface in a manner that suits the individual's workflow.

Having to learn how Apple has chosen to configure the interface is a substantial extra step that you've overlooked. And for people who want to understand the reasoning for a method to better predict how to use it going forward, there really is no way to confidently acclimate to this interface. Applications you will never use are adding substantial noise to the interface and apps you later install will rearrange the existing orientation.

If you're someone who only uses Spotlight to launch applications, nothing has changed for you. If you've never relied upon Launchpad as your primary productivity workflow, there is nothing you could positively contribute to this conversation. A core graphic user interface has been wholly deleted from the operating system with no similar replacement, for no apparent reason. The best you can do is try to understand that some people do not rely on a command line interface to launch applications and their brains work best in a dimension that can predict where things are for their ultimate productivity.

And by the way, had Spotlight been working properly for the past however many years, perhaps people would have learned to use it better. For me, the vast majority of the times, Spotlight can not find core applications like Calculator or Notes or Safari. The same can be said about Siri. If Apple released tools that worked predictably out of the gate, these tools would have a higher adoption rate.

Yes. This is a well known and documented issue.

Here's a post started 13 years ago with an update in 2021 https://apple.stackexchange.com/questions/62715/applications-dont-show-up-in-spotlight

And here's a post in this forum from 2021 Spotlight search not showing applications… - Apple Community

Perhaps Spotlight has gotten better but the point I've stated is that historically it has not worked flawlessly and has been unreliable. Where as LaunchPad is something that can be curated and relied upon without failure without having to put as much thought into it as Spotlight (when it works).

ESergei wrote:

I have the same problem. Spotlight can not find core applications like Calculator or Notes or Safari.

https://discussions.apple.com/content/attachment/c4d38bd4-29e8-46ba-af08-770f89878922

[Edited by Moderator]

Works fine for me:

Notes and Safari are found too.

I've had launchpad under the trackpad gesture, so I didn't need to use the keyboard at all, which DOES make a difference for convenience. If you don't see that then you don't see that, but I do, and I can't be the only one. Also, a much larger number of apps could be seen - and chosen from - at the same time, without scrolling. They were organized the way I want them (including custom folders) and not alphabetically. I had all my apps there, whereas the applications folder does NOT show my web apps.

I just moved to Mac from Windows a year ago, for the first time, and so I had to re-learn a great deal of things, and it wasn't a problem. It's not about re-learning, it's about losing a ton of functionality and convenience in the name of... what exactly?

[Edited by Moderator]

I agree with you about the ease of using the trackpad, but the most obvious value of the launchpad from my perspective was the ability to organize all of my apps into functional bins. I knew exactly where to look for video editing, audio editing, communications, and photography, each of which has myriad apps with names I don't care to recall.

Apple's removal of the launchpad has wasted a significant amount of my time and effort with streamlining the computer as a tool. It's the opposite of a "bicycle for your mind" as Mr. Jobs once put it. I miss him...