Xfce4-terminal has the functionality to have 1 drop-down window. This mode is inspired from consoles in computer games such as Quake which slide down from the top of the screen when a key is pressed, and slide back up when the key is pressed again.

You can start the drop-down mode by running xfce4-terminal --drop-down. Since the application as no keybinding code, it is advised to Application Shortcuts for this.

The first time xfce4-terminal --drop-down is passed to the application, it will create a drop-down window and show it on top of the active ¹⁾ monitor. Each other time the command is executed, the drop-down window will toggle its visibility.

When you start the drop-down window for the first time, the application opens a window on top of other windows at the top of the screen without window borders.

Drop-down window with 3 tabs

You can open the drop-down preferences by clicking the small button are the bottom-right corner of the tabs. The dialog can also be opened by right-clicking the tray icon – if enabled.

Drop-down window Preferences

Keep window open when it loses focus

This setting is applied during startup only and controls the initial state of the down toggle-button shown in the tab bar. If enabled the window will not close when it loses focus (not the active window anymore).

Always keep window on top

If enabled it asks the window manger to not be overlapped by other windows.

Use shortcut to focus visible window

Show status icon in notification area

Width

Height

Opacity

Duration

Always show tabs

Position

Move to monitor with pointer