Bar Glow

Full-width glow behind the stock Omarchy 4 (Quattro) bar, so icons and labels stay readable on any wallpaper. A settings panel tunes opacity, bloom, glow color, and glyph color. The bar icon that opens it is optional.

It does not replace omarchy.bar. Third-party full-bar clones currently fail to load because Bar.qml required properties are not injected at construction (#6915, #8007, #8202).

Install

omarchy plugin add https://github.com/07dcolem/bar-glow.git --enable

Omarchy will ask which bar section to use (default: right). That chip opens the panel. The icon is optional; Settings panel explains how to remove it and still open the panel.

If the folder is already at ~/.config/omarchy/plugins/bar-glow/:

omarchy plugin validate ~/.config/omarchy/plugins/bar-glow
omarchy-shell shell rescanPlugins
omarchy plugin enable bar-glow --section right
omarchy restart shell

Confirm:

hyprctl layers | grep -E 'omarchy-bar$|omarchy-bar-glow'
omarchy-shell bar-glow status
omarchy-shell bar-glow toggle

With a top bar you should see a bottom-layer wash covering the whole bar strip, plus a short bloom on the inner edge:

Layer level 1 (bottom):
  ... xywh: 0 0 1920 44, namespace: omarchy-bar-glow
Layer level 2 (top):
  ... xywh: 0 0 1920 26, namespace: omarchy-bar

The glow uses ExclusionMode.Ignore (exclusive zone -1) so it does not steal reserved space. It sits on WlrLayer.Bottom, so it shows through the transparent bar and never covers widgets or popouts.

Remove

omarchy plugin remove bar-glow

That deletes ~/.config/omarchy/plugins/bar-glow/ and removes the plugin from shell.json. Glyph color returns to the theme. Nothing is written under $OMARCHY_PATH or ~/.local/share/omarchy.

Settings panel

Left-click the bar chip (󰃝). The panel anchors to that icon.

The icon is optional. The plugin stays enabled as long as bar-glow is either on the bar or in plugins[]. To drop the icon and keep the glow:

1. Copy the bar-glow object from bar.layout into top-level plugins[], settings included.
2. Delete it from the layout section.
3. Save ~/.config/omarchy/shell.json. The shell reloads it.

Leave it in only one of those places. omarchy plugin remove deletes the first match, and the bar layout wins, so a second plugins[] copy would survive removal. Deleting the layout entry without adding plugins[] disables the plugin and the glow stops.

With the chip hidden, open the same panel with either command:

omarchy-shell shell toggle bar-glow
omarchy-shell bar-glow toggle

Those commands open the overlay. It has no icon to attach to, so the panel uses the existing top-left fallback. Clicking the chip, when it is on the bar, still anchors the panel to the icon. Forced glyph color still applies with the chip hidden, and theme-follow still tracks Color.foreground on omarchy theme set.

The panel is a stock Omarchy KeyboardPanel:

Control	What it does
On/off switch	Show or hide the glow
Use theme colors	Glow = theme background, glyphs = theme foreground, and both follow omarchy theme set
Opacity	Peak alpha of the wash (20–100%)
Bloom	Soft falloff past the inner edge (0–40 px)
Glow color	Saturation/value field, hue bar, presets, and hex. Picking a color turns off theme-follow
Force glyph color	Override the wallpaper-sampled bar text
Glyph color	Same color field as the glow (disabled when Force is off)

Changes apply live and persist to ~/.config/omarchy/shell.json. Esc closes the panel.

shell.json keys

Settings live on the bar-widget entry while the chip is on the bar. With the chip hidden they live on the plugins[] entry. When the chip is present only the bar entry is written, so omarchy plugin remove does not leave a second copy behind:

{
  "id": "bar-glow",
  "enabled": true,
  "size": 18,
  "opacity": 0.72,
  "color": "#000000",
  "forceWhite": true,
  "contentColor": "#ffffff",
  "followTheme": false
}

Key	Type	Default	Meaning
enabled	boolean	true	Draw the glow
size	integer	18	Bloom in px (0–48). 0 is wash only
opacity	number	0.72	Peak alpha. Values > 1 are treated as percent
color	string	#000000	Glow hex, or theme for Color.background
followTheme	boolean	false	Live-bind glow and glyphs to the active theme
forceWhite	boolean	true	Force glyph color (name is historical; the color is contentColor)
contentColor	string	#ffffff	Forced glyph hex, or theme for Color.foreground

Theme-follow is also what the Use theme colors button writes. A custom color picker value clears followTheme.

Behavior

• Follows bar position (top / bottom / left / right), including live drag.
• Hides with the bar (shell.bar.barHidden, including Super+Shift+Space).
• Multi-monitor: one glow surface per output.
• A click applies immediately through the service (applyLive), then updateEntryInline writes shell.json. While the chip is on the bar that write goes to the layout entry. With the chip hidden it goes to plugins[]. The service reads that file, so either location reaches the glow.
• Forced glyph color is owned by the service. It copies the theme shell values and sets bar.text. It does not assign Color.bar.text, so the bar's own color binding stays intact. The previous bar.text comes back when the glow is off, force-glyphs is off, or the plugin is removed or disabled. Theme-follow tracks Color.foreground, including omarchy theme set.

What this plugin does not do

• It does not become the active bar.
• It does not intercept pointer events (mask: Region {}).
• It does not change window gaps, rounding, or decoration.shadow.
• Colorful tray app icons keep their own pixels; glyphs and labels follow the forced color when that toggle is on.

Development

omarchy plugin validate .
omarchy-shell shell rescanPlugins
omarchy restart shell
omarchy-shell bar-glow status

Kinds: service (Service.qml, the glow and the glyph-color override), bar-widget (GlowChip.qml, optional bar icon), and overlay (GlowPanel.qml). Not bar. Hide the chip, leave the plugin enabled, and open settings with omarchy-shell shell toggle bar-glow or omarchy-shell bar-glow toggle. Forced glyph color still applies with the chip hidden. Files are not named BarWidget.qml / Panel.qml so they do not collide with qs.Ui.

Author

07dcolem — https://github.com/07dcolem/bar-glow

Disclaimer

This plugin is provided as-is, with no warranty of any kind. Omarchy plugins run unsandboxed inside your shell process, with the same access as your user account. Review the code before you enable it. The author is not liable for data loss, desktop breakage, theme changes, or any other damage from installing, using, or removing this plugin. A marketplace listing, if any, is not a security review.

License

MIT. Copyright (c) 2026 Dylan Coleman. See LICENSE.