WinNotch

WinNotch is a Dynamic Island-inspired notch overlay for Windows. It brings media controls, calendar, battery, webcam, volume and brightness HUDs, file staging, and installable plugins into a compact surface that can live at the top or side of the screen.

Built with WPF, .NET 8, and C#.

Links

• Home page: https://n3uralcreativity.github.io/WinNotch/
• Documentation: https://n3uralcreativity.github.io/WinNotch/documentation/
• Releases: https://github.com/N3uralCreativity/WinNotch/releases
• Plugin library repo: https://github.com/N3uralCreativity/WinNotch-Plugins
• Plugin development guide: PLUGIN_DEVELOPMENT.md

Features

• Dynamic notch with hover, click, drag, and scroll interactions
• Multi-monitor support: drag the island to any screen and dock it there; optional island on every screen with synchronized (or independent) open state
• Built-in media controls and audio visualizer
• Volume and brightness HUDs
• Calendar, battery, file shelf, and webcam mirror
• Light, dark, and auto theme support
• Position-aware layouts, including vertical plugin surfaces
• Plugin Manager and Plugin Browser with online library support
• Configurable plugins with built-in setup UI

Install

Release build

1. Download the latest installer from Releases.
2. Run WinNotch-Setup.exe.
3. Launch WinNotch.

Build from source

Requirements:

• Windows 10 or Windows 11
• .NET 8 SDK

git clone https://github.com/N3uralCreativity/WinNotch.git
cd WinNotch
dotnet run --project src/WinNotch/WinNotch.csproj

To create a publish folder:

dotnet publish src/WinNotch/WinNotch.csproj -c Release -r win-x64 --self-contained -p:PublishSingleFile=true -o publish

Plugins

WinNotch supports several plugin types:

• IUIPlugin
• IServicePlugin
• IAnimationPlugin
• IConfigurablePlugin

Plugins can be installed in two ways:

1. From the in-app Plugin Browser.
2. Manually by placing a plugin DLL in %AppData%\WinNotch\Plugins\<plugin-id>\.

The in-app browser only shows plugins listed in the WinNotch-Plugins repository's library.json. If a plugin is not listed there, it will not appear in the browser even if the DLL exists elsewhere.

Create plugins

If you want to build plugins:

• start with PLUGIN_DEVELOPMENT.md
• use the ready-to-send AI plugin prompt if you want another AI to build a plugin from zero context
• browse the live examples in Examples/Plugins
• use the WinNotch.PluginSdk package from GitHub Packages if you do not want to clone the full repo

The package is intended for plugin authors, not end users. Runtime installation still happens through the WinNotch app or manual DLL deployment.

Contributing

Contributions are welcome for both the app and the plugin ecosystem.

• app changes and plugin API changes belong in this repository
• community plugin browser listings belong in WinNotch-Plugins

If you want your plugin to appear in the browser, publish the DLL publicly, then add its manifest entry to WinNotch-Plugins/library.json.

License

GPL-3.0