Using Luma for Mac: window, menu bar, shortcuts

Mac & Luma Transfer, updated October 27, 2026

Luma for Mac is built for mouse and keyboard: a sidebar, search at the top of the window, the queue as its own column and almost every command in the menu bar as well.

The window

• Sidebar: The library at the top (albums, artists, songs, liked songs), your playlists and collections below, see Playlists and collections in the sidebar. A new playlist opens the song picker right away, and an empty playlist has an Add Songs button.
• Home: If you like, a page of your own at the very top with everything you pin and what you played recently. Turn it on under Settings › General › Custom Home and arrange it with Edit at the top right.
• Playback bar: The player floats at the bottom with a progress bar, volume and AirPlay picker. Click the cover or title to open the album. With Settings › Appearance › Cover in the mini player › Large, the cover reaches down to the progress bar. If you've turned on Technical Details, a button next to AirPlay opens them for the playing song.
• Queue: View › Show Queue (⌥⌘Q) opens it as a column next to the page.

Playlists and collections in the sidebar

Since Luma for Mac 1.2, you can do a lot right in the sidebar:

• Create: the + at the bottom of the sidebar creates a playlist, a dynamic playlist or a collection.
• Right-click: rename a playlist or collection, give it a new cover or delete it. For dynamic playlists you can also edit the rules there or convert it into a regular playlist.
• Hover: move the pointer over a playlist or collection and play and shuffle appear. While it plays, play becomes pause.
• What's playing: the playlist or collection the music comes from is marked.

Dynamic playlists have their own section above the other playlists. To show all of them in one list, turn off Separate dynamic playlists under Settings › General. Right-click also lets you show or hide entries in the sidebar.

Search and select

The search field at the top (⌘F) finds songs, albums, artists and playlists at once. On an album or playlist page, the matching songs from that page come first.

Double-click a song to play it. Hold ⌘ or ⇧ to select several songs. A bar then appears with Play Next, Add to Playlist and Like. A right-click opens a menu for the whole selection, and Esc clears it.

Quick search from anywhere

Since Luma for Mac 1.1, ⌃⌥Space opens a search field over any app, even while Luma is in the background. Like the search field in the window, it finds songs, artists, albums and playlists.

• ↩ or a click plays the result, and the field closes.
• ⌥↩ plays it next. The field stays open so you can queue the next song right away.
• ⌘↩ shows the result in Luma and brings the window to the front.
• With an empty field, you see the playing song with previous, play and next.

Esc or a click outside closes the field. You change the shortcut under Settings › Playback › Quick Search: click the shortcut and press the new combination, together with ⌘, ⌥ or ⌃. If another app already uses it, Luma tells you there. The Quick search with a shortcut switch turns the feature off entirely.

Player in the menu bar

The Luma icon in the menu bar shows what’s playing and what’s up next, without opening the window. Click the cover or title to bring Luma to the front. Since version 1.1 the menu bar player has a volume control of its own, and a click on the speaker icon mutes.

The Dock menu

Right-click the Luma icon in the Dock to control playback without opening the window: Play or Pause, Next Track and Previous Track, like the playing song, Shuffle and Repeat.

Media keys

macOS sends the play, next and previous keys to whichever app played something last, such as a browser tab with a video. With Settings › Playback › Always send media keys to Luma, the keys always control Luma as long as a track is loaded there.

Equalizer and sound

The equalizer has its own window: Playback › Equalizer… (⌥⌘E). Ten bands from 32 Hz to 16 kHz, presets such as Bass Boost, Treble, Vocal and Loudness, and a double-click sets a band back to 0 dB. Cross-fade and volume normalization are under Settings › Playback. How it all sounds is explained in Sound, equalizer & cross-fade.

Edit info

Right-click a song or album › Edit Info. ⇥ moves through the fields, ↩ saves, Esc cancels. To change a cover, simply drag an image from the Finder onto it. Luma suggests artists, album artists and genres from your library.

Discord status

With Settings › Playback › Show status in Discord, your friends on Discord see what you’re listening to. Hide title shows just “Listening to Luma”. For this, Luma only talks to the Discord app on your Mac and uploads nothing. It’s off by default.

Settings

Luma › Settings… (⌘,) opens a window of its own with four sections:

Every keyboard shortcut

Still have a question or found a mistake? Email hello@suenavus.com.