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I assumed it was at first but it's stayed the same throughout the betas so now thinking it's by design. Don't like it at all.
 
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Yeah that was the case till Big Sur(and it was good), but in Monterey it is always black(in full screen) regardless of anything is in the background
 
Strange design decision, I still think this is a bug..

Hopefully someone finds a way to change it back.
 
The menu bar isn’t glitchy it’s changes color depending on the wallpaper
I think that's why it's black. In full screen, there is no wallpaper to speak of, so it kind of makes sense that the menu bar would be black. Plus, it hides the camera cutout on the newer Macs. I think Apple did that on purpose.
 
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I think that's why it's black. In full screen, there is no wallpaper to speak of, so it kind of makes sense that the menu bar would be black. Plus, it hides the camera cutout on the newer Macs. I think Apple did that on purpose.

The curve ball is there is a wallpaper behind full screen windows. When you open Expose or LaunchPad you see it, and annoyingly it sticks with the wallpaper status of when you went full screen. The wallpaper also tints windows and shows in areas such as the side bar.

So let’s say you full screened a window last night while dark mode was enabled, it will stick with the dark wallpaper even though you are now using light mode.

You notice it much less now the menu bar is black but it catches you every now and again and is an annoying niggle that for some reason has never been addressed.
 
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Seeing this also on 2019 16" MBP on Monterey. It wouldn't be an issue if the icons colors didn't take time to update (from white to black and back again) when switching desktops. But because they do, I would really prefer if the menu bar just stayed the same color even in full screen mode. It makes switching between fullscreen desktops and regular desktops super buggy.
 
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