Hyprland Workspaces Are Special

You are probably accustomed to numbered workspaces in Hyprland. They are those little numbers on the top left of your screen in the Omarchy bar. Once you figure out the keyboard shortcuts and a good system for associating apps with workspaces, you’ll be flying!

But did you know about special workspaces? A special workspace is a temporary workspace that floats on top of your current workspace and can be toggled on and off. It’s like minimizing and maximizing a window in MacOS or Windows.

In Omarchy, this is called the scratchpad and you can toggle it with SUPER + S. I remember the first time I hit that shortcut by accident. My screen suddenly turned dimmer and I didn’t know how to get out of it. Fun times!

But a scratchpad can be super useful for quick glances and keeping an app opened but out of sight.

In this post, I want to show you how we can take the concept of special workspaces even further so a single key combo can toggle an app.

1. Name it

Here is how you can toggle a special workspace from the terminal:

hyprctl dispatch 'hl.dsp.workspace.toggle_special("music")'

Here, music is just the name I gave to the workspace. It could be any other name.

That’s cool, but not super useful by itself.

2. Toggle it with Lua

Quattro uses ~/.config/hypr/bindings.lua for your shortcuts. Add this function there:

local function toggle_music()
  local current = hl.get_active_special_workspace()
  local was_open = current and current.name == "special:music"

  hl.dispatch(hl.dsp.workspace.toggle_special("music"))
  if not was_open then
    hl.exec_cmd("omarchy-launch-or-focus spotify")
  end
end~/.config/hypr/bindings.lua

It checks the focused monitor’s special workspace before toggling. If Music was open, it closes without launching or focusing Spotify again. Otherwise it opens Music, then launches Spotify or focuses its existing window. The Lua API exposes that state directly, so we no longer need the old Bash helper.

3. Bind it

Below the function in the same file, replace the default music shortcut:

hl.unbind("SUPER + SHIFT + M")
o.bind("SUPER + SHIFT + M", "Toggle Spotify workspace", toggle_music)~/.config/hypr/bindings.lua

Quattro installs Spotify on demand through omarchy install service spotify. Install it first if needed.

4. Place and size it

A launch-or-focus command can find Spotify on any workspace. Let’s give new Spotify windows an explicit home, and keep their size manageable.

Add these rules at the bottom of ~/.config/hypr/hyprland.lua, after the existing imports. If you followed Float that window!, you can put them in your loaded windows.lua instead:

o.window("^[Ss]potify$", { workspace = "special:music silent" })
o.window({ class = "^[Ss]potify$", workspace = "special:music" }, {
  float = true,
  size = { 1200, 750 },
  center = true,
})~/.config/hypr/hyprland.lua

Check Spotify’s actual class with hyprctl clients and adjust the match if necessary. These window rules apply the initial placement and size when a window opens. Close Spotify before testing, reload with hyprctl reload, and check hyprctl configerrors.

Press SUPER + SHIFT + M to launch it in Music. Press again to hide it, and once more to bring it back without creating another window. Also test while another special workspace is open and after changing monitors. Adjust the dimensions if 1200 by 750 is too large for your display.

If you followed the old version, remove the binding that called toggle-special-workspace. You can delete that helper once nothing else uses it. These examples have been checked against the Lua APIs; the window placement and focus behavior still need validation in your session.

Is this useful at all?

Personally, I like it but it’s easy to overdo it. I only use it for music and todos to keep the apps opened at all times but out of sight. A single keybinding lets me quickly toggle them on and off.