Where are my missing Photoshop tools?

By Kelly Barkhurst

June 26, 2025

3 Min read

In Print Graphic Design

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Photoshop seems to be hiding tools you used before? Don’t worry! If your Crop tool doesn’t show that little triangle (which hides extra tools like Slice), you’re probably in a stripped-down workspace. Let me show you how to bring everything back.

How do I find a missing Photoshop Tool?

There are several ways to find or locate missing tools in Photoshop.

Go to Window → Workspace, then switch from Core Tools to Essentials.
Use the Search bar (Photoshop CC+): type “Slice” (or any missing tool) to locate and highlight it instantly.
See the triangle icon appear on tools like Crop — indicating hidden options.

Option 1: Switch Workspace

To view different (more or less tools) in your PS Tool Bar navigate to Window > Workspace and choose a different Workspace setting. Core Tools is missing several tools you might be looking for, such as the Slice tool.

Change your workspace setting to view and access additional PS tools

Option 2: Use Search Bar

A quick effective way to find just the tool you’re looking for is to use the Search bar. When you click Search (magnifying glass icon in top right of screen) the discover modal will pop-up. Search for the missing tool and then select the desired tool from the search results.

Use search to find missing Photoshop tools

Option 3: Tool bar triangle icon and ellipse

Click and hold where the tiny triangle is visible in the bottom right of each icon. This will display a fly out pane of more tools.

There are even more tools not shown. Hold and click either the last tool visible in your tool bar (it should have a little triangle in the bottom right side) or the horizontal ellipse. This will allow you to select from additional tools and/or personalize/edit your tool bar.

Edit my photoshop toolbar using the Edit Tools, horizontal ellipse icon.

Watch the video to help find missing tools in Photoshop

Hello Photoshop users. This is a really quick short about when you click a tool, and you do not see the little triangle on the bottom that says there are tools under this tool, that there are more tools that you can choose. So, someone might say, “under this crop tool, my tutorial says that there is a slice tool and there just really isn’t. Look, there’s no triangle.” And that is because under Workspace you can have different sets of tools. If it’s under Core Tools, it’s very limited. If you switch to Essentials, you can see now my crop tool has a triangle saying that there are more tools. So if you are missing tools that you know should be there, I would say come into your Window > Workspace, and try a different workspace setup. In addition, you can always use the search bar and search for any of your tools and it will come up with your tools and even highlight and show you where it would exist. So in this case, if I was on Core Tools and I said slice, it brings it up as a bottom tool, right? So it’s kind of brought it for me. Alright, I hope that helps.

Happy Photoshopping!

Found this helpful?👍 Let me know in the comments which option your use the most!
Want more Photoshop fast tips? Subscribe to my youtube channel or check out my other blog posts.

Wondering how to best use grids in Photoshop to increase the professionalism of your compositions? It’s easier than you think!

While you’re digging through Photoshop’s panels, did you know you can also use artboards to organize multi-size projects like a pro? Learn more in our Photoshop artboards for multi‑format campaigns guide.

About the author

Kelly Barkhurst

Designer to Fullstack is my place to geek out and share tech solutions from my day-to-day as a graphic designer, programmer, and business owner (portfolio). I also write on Arts and Bricks, a parenting blog and decal shop that embraces my family’s love of Art and LEGO bricks!

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