Run the Claude and Codex desktop apps side by side, with one sidebar, as one window

The problem

Watching a Claude chat and a Codex thread at the same time usually means two free-floating windows, each with its own sidebar taking up room. Tile them with macOS and each gets half the screen, both sidebars included; move one and the other stays behind.

• Two sidebars list two sets of chats, so a third of the space goes on navigation you don't need twice.
• The windows don't move or resize together, so the arrangement falls apart as soon as you drag one.
• Splitting the space unevenly (a wide Claude, a narrow Codex) means resizing both windows by hand, every time.
• Plugging in a display, or unplugging it, scatters them again.

How Pairbar solves it

1. Allow Accessibility
   Moving windows needs macOS's Accessibility permission, the same one switching apps uses. Without it, Pairbar shows how to allow it.
2. Choose Basket
   Use the layout button in the sidebar's header (next to the new-chat button), type "Basket" in ⌘K, or give it a shortcut in Settings → Shortcuts. The window you're using stays where it is, at its size, and the other app docks next to it: on the right when there's room there, otherwise on the side with more room.
3. Pick an arrangement
   Side by side, Stacked or Focus, from the same menu, ⌘K or the small pill on the basket's top edge. Swap apps (⌃⌥⌘S) exchanges their places; in Focus, it brings the other app to the front in the same spot.
4. Share the room
   Drag the line between the apps (↔, or ↕ when stacked). It settles on 50/50 when you're close, stops where either app would get smaller than 420 pt or than the app allows, and Side by side and Stacked each remember the split you set.
5. Move and resize it as one
   Drag the sidebar's empty space or header, or either app by its title bar, to move the basket; drag any outer edge or corner to resize it. The apps take their new places once, when you let go.
6. Save the setup
   Settings → Windows → Save current setup… remembers the basket's frame, arrangement and split for the displays connected now. Turn on Restore a saved setup when displays change to have it come back when you plug in or unplug a display.

Shortcuts

The three arrangements

Leaving Focus brings back the split you had. Overlay (the red button at the sidebar's top-left, or the layout menu) takes you back to Pairbar's starting mode: both apps in the basket's frame, one on top of the other, and the sidebar over the front one's.

One sidebar, not three

With Hide the apps' own sidebars in the basket on (Settings → Windows, on to start with), docking hides each app's own sidebar by pressing the item in its View menu, never a keystroke. Pairbar's sidebar is then the basket's only one, and the apps show just their chat. Going back to Overlay puts their sidebars back the way they were; the layout menu can show one again while you stay docked. See the apps' own sidebars.

Window buttons

• The basket's own buttons, at the sidebar's top-left, act on the whole group: red goes back to Overlay (both apps stay open), yellow minimises both apps and the basket, green fills the screen with the basket.
• Each app's own buttons still work, and Pairbar follows them: close or minimise one and its place offers Open or Restore; its green button fills the screen with the whole basket; full screen takes that app out of the group, and the other keeps its place.

Limits

• Claude and Codex won't go narrower than their own minimum width, and the basket never gets smaller than both allow. If both minimums don't fit side by side on the display, Pairbar stacks them (or shows them in Focus) and says why.
• A window already in macOS full screen, minimised or on another Space isn't moved; the basket shows what to do in its place.
• Pairbar docks each app's front window, not any others.
• With Stage Manager on, the basket still works, but Stage Manager may move one window into a stage of its own; Pairbar warns you.

From the Tasks view, Open all in basket opens a task's newest Claude and Codex chats and docks them side by side, Claude on the left.

Without Pairbar

Without Pairbar, macOS and window managers can put the two apps next to each other, but not make them behave as one: