Get Started with the New SharePoint App Bar

If you’ve noticed something different about your SharePoint sites recently, you’re not alone. Microsoft has recently introduced the new SharePoint app bar as a new navigation element inside SharePoint Online! (If you aren’t seeing this new feature yet, it will be rolled out soon to your tenant).

Between now and October 31, 2021 (spooky!), you do have the option of disabling this feature, but past that date, it will become standard on all of your sites (minus guests, who will not see it).

The 2 commands related to this temporary disablement option are the following:

#Determine whether the app bar has been temporarily disabled
#(false = no, true = yes)
Get-SPOTemporarilyDisableAppBar

#Temporarily disable the app bar
#(use $false to enable, use $true to disable)
Set-SPOTemporarilyDisableAppBar $false

This new navigation element now gives users an additional option for global navigation beyond utilizing Hub Site navigation and/or an application customizer. By default, the “Home” icon will point to your SharePoint Start page if you haven’t customized the navigation yet. The other 3 items (“My Sites”, “My News”, “My Files”) are all powered by the Microsoft Graph and are not currently editable.

For customizing the home navigation, you’ll need to have created a home site, ensure you’ve shared it with all users so that they have access to its navigation, and then you’ll have the following options:

1. If your home site is a hub:
   1. Utilize the home site’s navigation
   2. Utilize the hub or global navigation source
2. If your home site is not a hub:
   1. Utilize the home site’s navigation
   2. Select Hub or global navigation to create your custom navigation

Finally, do note that the placement of this app bar for resolutions 1024px or wider will be to the left of the entire page, including any application customizers you’ve created that place content in the header and/or footer areas. For a width of less than 1024px the app bar will be located horizontally at the bottom of the page (as pictured below).

Cheers,
Matt