Retaining clip on 3rd generation rear bumper caps

I'm looking at eliminating the chrome look of my rear bumper caps. I plan on using a truck bed liner product. I'm confident in prepping and application of bed liner to the caps. My concern is reinstalling the single metal retaining clip for each cap. Is there a way to do this? Or can you safely leave them off?
From looking at the rear of my truck, near the taillights, it looks like I can access the boxed in area that the retaining clips go in. It appears that removing the taillights will provide access to reinstall the clips. Is this a possibility? Thanks in advance for all input.

 

I left mine off and couldn't really tell any difference.

 

I was debating leaving them off. Being a retired military aviation mechanic, there is that internal struggle to put all parts that were removed back on! I'm gonna remove a taillight and see if that provides access to the metal clip, before removing the bumper caps. I'll post if that works or not.

 

Yeah i feel you on that. i had to remove my entire bumper assembly so it was definitely easier to access but still a pain.

To be honest I couldn't figure out how to get the clips to stay so at that point I just said F this and left them off lol

 

Haven't removed and replaced my bumper caps yet (still toying w/the idea of flush mount aux lights in the caps), but here's the best video I've found on getting this thing back on without removing a lot more bumper bits.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t6A4KRNGip4

 

I painted my OEM ones shortly after buying the truck. Never installed the metal clip. Just last week I swapped them out again for OEM blacks and there was never an issue. There's like 6 or so of those black push clips holding it on.

 

I watched the YouTube video suggested. It by far was the most informative video on this issue. Thanks for the suggestion!

 

Getting ready to replace my caps soon. Anyone have good luck doing what this video shows?

 

Yo! Are there safety/locking clips I’ll need to deal with to replace my cap? Videos I found are only for 2016-2020, and a few people said the installation changed.

 

Check out post #22 for a write-up. Post #5 has an exploded view of parts. This link was helpful when I had to replace the center position on my 2016. Not sure if the procedure has changed for later years.

https://www.tacomaworld.com/threads/16-tacoma-bumper-cap-removal.404082/page-2

As for retaining clips, I keep a box of these on my shelf.