Bartended

Performance-patched Bartender4 fork. Drop-in replacement: same SavedVariables, same profiles, same settings. Install and your existing config carries over with zero setup.

Why This Exists

Bartender4 is the #1 CPU consumer during combat in most addon setups. It reacts to dozens of WoW events per second (cooldown updates, proc glows, spell casts) and every time, it loops through all your buttons. With 3-4 bars that's 40+ buttons being touched on every event, many times per frame.

Bartended fixes this with targeted patches to LibActionButton, the library that does all the real work. Nothing about how bars look or behave has changed. Your buttons, keybinds, profiles, and Masque skins all work exactly the same, they just cost less CPU.

What's Faster

Proc glow dispatch is instant. When a proc lights up (or fades), stock BT4 loops through every button on every bar checking if it matches. With 40 active buttons and procs firing 50+ times per second in combat, that's thousands of wasted checks. Bartended builds a reverse lookup table, proc events go directly to the right button. No loop, no waste.

Range checks only run on buttons that need them. Stock BT4 checks IsInRange() on all ~120 buttons every 0.2 seconds. Bartended classifies buttons when they change and only polls spells, items, and spell-macros. Empty slots, mounts, toys, and flyouts are skipped. The polling loop drops from ~120 buttons to ~15-30.

Burst events are batched. WoW fires cooldown, usable, charge, and loss-of-control events multiple times per frame during combat. Stock BT4 processes each one separately, looping all buttons each time. Bartended collapses them, multiple events in the same frame produce one update next frame.

Spell cast events are filtered. Several spellcast events were being processed for every player in your raid group instead of just your own character. Fixed with unit-filtered event registration.

Duplicate work is merged. Some spellcast handlers looped through all buttons twice for the same spell. Merged into single passes.

Commands

All original Bartender4 commands work unchanged:

Command	Description
`/bt`	Open configuration panel
`/bt4`	Open configuration panel (alias)
`/bartender`	Open configuration panel (alias)
`/bartender4`	Open configuration panel (alias)
`/bartended`	Open configuration panel (new)

Compatibility

WoW Midnight 12.0.x, Classic Era, Cataclysm Classic, Wrath Classic
Masque skin support
LibDBIcon minimap button
LibDualSpec profile switching
Same Bartender4DB SavedVariables: existing profiles and bar layouts transfer automatically
Part of the Knowledge addon suite (KnowledgeDemon, Belphegor, Azazel)

Installation

Download and extract into your Interface/AddOns/ folder
(overwrites the existing Bartender4 automatically)
Log in
(your existing profiles and bar layouts are preserved)

No configuration or migration needed.

Credits
Original Bartender4 by Nevcairiel (EU-Zirkel des Cenarius) - wowace.com/projects/bartender4

Performance patches by DogGodFrogLog