Disabling Notification Center in macOS Big Sur 11.4

I absolutely hate the Notification Center in macOS. I had successfully turned it off permanently in an earlier version of Big Sur by executing the following commands in the Terminal, followed by a restart:

launchctl unload -w /System/Library/LaunchAgents/com.apple.notificationcenterui.plist

killall NotificationCenter

However, upon upgrading to 11.4, the Notification Center reappeared spontaneously, and I could not turn it off again by executing the above commands. When I tried, the following error message appeared:

Unload failed: 5: Input/output error

If I try

sudo launchctl unload -w /System/Library/LaunchAgents/com.apple.notificationcenterui.plist

it gives me

Unload failed: 113: Could not find specified service

After some experimentation, I found a makeshift solution. I had to go to Recovery Mode and turn off System Integrity Protection by executing the following command in the Terminal:

csrutil disable

After a restart, the launchctl command above works and the Notification Center remains permanently disabled.

But! If I go back to Recovery Mode and enable System Integrity Protection again by executing the command

csrutil enable

then the Notification Center appears again in “normal” mode after a restart.

Question: How big of a deal is it to leave System Integrity Protection disabled? Experts seem to agree it is a bad idea because it creates a security liability. But if leaving it turned off is the price I have to pay for getting rid of the Notification Center, I lean towards paying that price. At the same time, I wonder if there is a superior solution. Any thoughts/advice on this?

Solution 1:

Temporary Solution

I've had the same issues. The only workaround I could come up with, is to minimise the area it took in my Menu Bar. The Notification Center icon is just a Digital clock and changing it to Analog in System Preferences > Dock & Menu Bar > Clock.

Solution 2:

I think (not absolutely sure) if you turn Notifications off with the method mentioned above, you do not get battery warnings anymore (on MacBooks, i.e. if battery drops below x%). I had that with my old MacBook/Catalina, it just turned off when battery went down, no warning beforehand. That said: I'd love to replace NC with a Notifications-Dock-Icon and put widgets (those very few I actually use: weather) on the desktop. Is there an app for this?