Installing Windows on a Mac using the official Boot Camp Assistant software is certainly the easiest and best way of installing Windows on a Mac computer. In addition to the fact that it’s extremely easy to use and set up, when you install Windows using Boot Camp, Windows, and apps will have full access to the hardware, unlike virtual machines.
After installing Windows on Mac using Boot Camp, you need to install the Boot Camp drivers in order to get the trackpad and other features working.
With default settings, Boot Camp sits in the system tray area of the taskbar and lets you quickly access the Boot Camp Control Panel, which in turn allows you to change the default start-up disk and a couple of keyboard and trackpad settings. The other advantage of having the Boot Camp icon in the system tray is that you can quickly reboot into macOS by right-clicking on the Boot Camp icon and then clicking Restart in the macOS option.
But if, for some reason, the Boot Camp icon is missing from the system tray area and it used to appear when you had installed Boot Camp for the first time, you can follow the given below instructions to add the same to the system tray in Windows.
Method 1:
Check if the Boot Camp icon is hidden
For Windows 10
(Scroll down for previous Windows versions)
Step 1: Open the Settings app. Navigate to Personalization > Taskbar.
Step 2: In the Notification area section, click Select which icons appear on taskbar link.
Step 3: On the resulting page, turn on the Boot Camp Manager entry.
For Windows 8/8.1
Step 1: Click on the small up arrow icon in the system tray (see picture ) to see hidden icons, and then click Customize option.
Step 2: Scroll down the list to see if the Boot Camp Manager entry is present. If Boot Camp Manager exists, set its behavior to Show icon and notifications by selecting the same from the drop-down menu. And if the Boot Camp icon doesn’t exist there, follow the instructions mentioned in Method 2.
Method 2:
Make sure that Boot Camp Manager is starting with Windows
If you are on Windows 10/8.1:
Step 1: Open Task Manager by right-clicking on the empty space of the taskbar and then clicking the Task Manager option.
Step 2: Switch to the Startup tab and make sure that Boot Camp isn’t disabled here. If it’s disabled, select Boot Camp entry and then click Enable. That’s it!
If you’re on Windows 7:
Step 1: Open the System Configuration utility. To do that, open the Run dialog with the help of the Command + R hotkey, type Msconfig in the box, and the press enter key.
Step 2: Switch to the Startup tab and then make sure that Boot Camp Manager is starting with Windows.
Method 3
Add Boot Camp icon to the taskbar system tray
NOTE: This method works on Windows 10/8/7.
Step 1: Open the Control Panel. To do this, open the Run dialog box by simultaneously pressing the Windows logo and R keys. In the resulting box, type Control.exe, and then press Enter key.
Step 2: Change the Control Panel view to Small icons. You should now see the Boot Camp applet in the Control Panel.
Step 3: Right-click on the Boot Camp applet and then click Create shortcut to create a shortcut for Boot Camp on the desktop.
Step 4: Next, you need to put this shortcut in the Startup folder. To do so, open the Run dialog box again with the help of the Windows + R hotkey.
Step 5: In the Run box, type shell:startup and then press the enter key to open the Startup folder.
Step 6: Now, copy or move the shortcut that you have just created on the desktop to the Startup folder. That’s it!
Step 7: Restart your PC to see the Boot Camp in the system tray. From here onwards, the Boot Camp icon will automatically start with Windows and will be available to access from the system tray.
Michael Antonelli says
I have similar issues with my iMac. I’m thinking about switching Windows from Bootcamp to a virtual machine like VirtualBox. Contemplating it because it will fix all of these issues, however, the screen size with VirtualBox isn’t full size to the monitor and I’m not paying for Parallels.
To the person who is dissing Apple’s OS compared to Microsoft…you are dead wrong. The macOS is less tempormental and glitchy than MS ISO. These issues aren’t issues of the Mac system…they are all caused by Windows.
I have had Macs all my life until I found Windows says
Macs are overrated crap. End of story. Make yourself a favour and buy a PC
Jihoyler says
I tried all article’s methods multiple times, did not work, Boot Camp icon does not appear in the systray at all. Also, Boot Camp forgets settings very often, at least on every sleep/resume. And shows incorrect options selected, i.e. Boot Camp Control Panel settings do not correspond the actual active settings. And the F-keys settings (“Use all F1…”) on the touchbar randomly revert spontaneously. It’s all extremely buggy. Not to mention zero support from Apple, almost zero support on display drivers (huge incompatibilities), extremely bad drivers for WiFi and Bluetooth…. The list is endless. Basically Apple does not support Windows at all, Boot Camp is just a dying legacy relic. Well, the new M1 processor apparently won’t support Windows anyway, so that’s it, then.
Anyway, if somebody knows new methods to get the Boot Camp systray icon visible, please tell.
Limon says
Thanks
max says
I accidentally deleted Boot Camp from startup. I use the startup Manager. There used to be an entry for Boot Camp. Now it’s gone, and I don’t remember what it looked like. I ask the Boot Camp user to view the boot Camp startup path for me. Do this please, look in some startup Manager please!
John Chan says
I have a MacBookPro Model 11.3 (15″ Retina) with BootCamp Windows 7 Ultimate SP1. I used to have the BootCamp icon in the System Tray. Recently, I notice the icon is no longer there (don’t know when did that happened).
I followed the instrustions of here how to fix the problem, but for my machine, it didn’t worked.
Ithen thought reinstalled (run setup.exe) of my BootCamp driver package (the same old one used for this machine) thinking that would solve the issue, time of that was the last night before. Then my nightmare started and lost hours of sleep.
I rebooted the machine after the reinstallion of the BootCamp package, and all I got was BOD; BLUE SCREEN OF DEATH in Windows; worst kind scenario of ALL.
THEN;
I did reboot from Last Know Good Restore Point, BOD;
I booted it in Safe Mode, yes it worked and start to unintall drivers;
one at a time and reboot once at a time -> BOD.
I did System Restore from recent restore point. –> BOD;
I did System Restore from an older restore point. –>BOD;
I did System Restore from an even older restore point. –>BOD;
I did System Restore from an even older, older restore point. –>BOD;
Frustrated;
I recalled by accident I backed up my System Retore Point recently with a 3rd party software named Advanced Uninstaller.
I booted the machine up with Safe Mode (still worked), ran the software and restored the restore point.
ShutDown the machine and reboot and kept my finger crossed.
It booted up with the Windows 7, icon locations scrambled, screen resolution screwed up, BootCamp ControlPanel icon still not found in System Tray but at least not BOD. All I needed to do is find out what is missing and reinstall.
Moral of the story is: Don’t mess with BootCamp. I went through 3 MacBookPro 15.4″ with BootCamp Windows 7, unbelievable amount of hours losted in keeping the machine running software-wise.
I don’t recommand novice Windows users using Apple Machines running BootCAMP. !!!
P.S. I also had a 21″ iMac running with BootCamp ( I bought the machine when it was on sales saving $400).
The machine BootCamp died and I still couldn’t get it worked again. The Mac portion is OK but I have things in the BootCamp section that I don’t want to rebuilt the BootCamp section and lose everything.
Lenny says
Hi,
I have a similar problem with Windows 10 running via Bootcamp on a mid 2012 Macbook Air.
The output of my problem is, that specific functions doesn’t work, such as the right click (two finger click), scrolling with two fingers and the function keys behind the F1 till F12 keys.
Also the bootcamp icon isn’t there.
It seams like its a driver problem, even though I tried do manually download the drivers with the boocamp assistant on mac.
In your online manual you are saying that to disable the bootcamp icon I could just enable it with cmd+S/settings/taskbar/enabling it or task manager/startup/bootcamp or control panel/bootcamp.
My problem is that following all these solutions, I can’t find bootcamp anywhere.
It is like bootcamp just dosn’t exist here.
Do you have any idea about what could be wrong?
Cheers
Lenny
admin says
@ Person
Thanks for letting us know the that typo. We have corrected it.
Austin says
Not seeing Boot Camp anywhere within Windows 10. I tried all control panel items and it is simply nowhere. I cannot get my keyboard to light up, scrolling doesn’t work, and the touchbar no longer comes on. I have gone into MacOS and when I try to open Boot Camp Assistant there is an error that says I have to reformat the drive to OSX Journaled. I do not believe this is true though because I am currently typing this from Windows 10 on my MBP. The Mac partition is APFS, and the Windows is just regular Windows NTFS.
Person says
This is the worst article ever. Bootcamp is for ppl with a Mac. If you have a Mac there is no windows key. Stop saying window + XYZ key. Worst
Np says
After all efforts if u do not find it in windows system,go in mac systems with action od simultaneously press power n optin key you will find both operating system start up icon select machentosh and open boot camp and action option then download bootcamp supporting files in a fat format usb drive then insatall in windows.after installation boot camp icon and its all supporting file will work.
oscar says
My bootcamp icon is not showing anywhere. I have a MacBook Pro and I installed windows 7. I have followed all different instructions to find the bootcamp icon but it’s not anywhere. The bootcamp icon is not showing in “All Control Panel Items”
MacBonkers says
FWIW, if none of the above steps worked, I am guessing you may have had the same issue I did: installing Windows from DVD. When I installed Windows from USB, then the Boot Camp applet for the Control Panel showed up as were all the drivers properly installed.