Hi r/macapps,

I'm Rohit from ScaleNinja Software, the developer of MacVisor (Mac Virtualization Platform), DeltaSnap (APFS Snapshot Manager), DriveSync (Google Drive Backup/Sync), Noject (Disk Ejection Protector) and DeltaSync (Backup/Folder Sync).

MacVisor 27.2 is our first GA release after a public beta, and we'd love your feedback.

Download and try it free: https://scaleninja.com/macvisor/

Docs: https://scaleninja.com/docs/macvisor/

Launch Blog: MacVisor: run your Mac like a virtualization host

Requirement: macOS 27 on Apple Silicon and others documented.

Transparency:

• Company profile: https://www.linkedin.com/company/scaleninja/
• Support: https://scaleninja.com/support/
• Apple Developer Team ID: VXNWQ9H93X
• Privacy: https://scaleninja.com/privacy/
• Terms: https://scaleninja.com/terms/
• We have been working in open source infrastructure and Apache CloudStack since 2014, and are now focused on niche virtualization and infrastructure software: https://scaleninja.com/about/

# Problem

Running VMs on an Apple Silicon Mac usually means one of two things:

• A subscription for a polished tool
• An afternoon of setup with a free one (finding the right image, clicking through installers, creating accounts, adding SSH keys, installing guest tools and drivers, then wiring up networking).

Do that for every new VM, and again when one breaks, and it adds up.

Then you want a VM to keep running after you close the app, or on a headless Mac mini, or under a script, and most desktop tools stop there.

MacVisor aims to bring the best out of the box seamless setup and integration you've seen on Mac, as already experienced by some of our early adopters: https://scaleninja.com/macvisor/#testimonials

What MacVisor does differently: Its Architecture

Built like a hypervisor, not just an app: An always-on background service owns the VMs. Each VM runs in its own isolated process, so VMs keep running when you close the window, and one crashing doesn't take down the others. For more details: https://scaleninja.com/macvisor/#architecture

Three operational modes:

• Use the GUI for desktop virtualization
• Use the `mvz` CLI for CI and lab automation
• Use as headless virtualization host for server Mac minis and Mac Studios

... with auto-start at login and high availability per VM. Refer: https://scaleninja.com/macvisor/#modes

Guest OS Support: Seamless and automatic guest setup, natively on Apple's own Virtualization framework:

• Linux: Out of the box support for Ubuntu, Debian, Fedora, Rocky, AlmaLinux, Oracle Linux, CentOS Stream, openSUSE and Alpine from the official Linux vendor distro published cloud images. You get your account, your SSH keys and the guest agent, plus Docker, Podman or k3s if you want them. Ready in a couple of minutes, or tick Install Ubuntu Desktop for a GNOME desktop.
• macOS: installed and set up with no Setup Assistant to click through for macOS 27. (supported macOS 27, 26, 15, 14)
• Windows 11 on ARM (Tech Preview): installed unattended from Microsoft's ISO in about 10 minutes, with drivers, Remote Desktop and sound. Probably, a world-first to run Windows 11 on ARM natively on Virtualization.framework.
• FreeBSD (experimental) and appliances like pfSense-based, OPNsense or OpenWrt.

Refer more at: https://scaleninja.com/macvisor/#guests

Storage: Supports live snapshots (with memory), disk-only snapshots, linked clones, templates and export/import. Also back up a running VM by exporting a snapshot. The VM keeps running. (Based on feedback/asked by macadmins)

Several advancements in storage support, including linked-clones, ASIF disks & layers, seamless and automatic shared folders, multiple storage location, APFS file cloning, USB storage passthrough and warm migration of VMs with disks across storage locations.

Networking: You'd normally need a server for:

• NAT, bridged, and your own custom networks (shared or host-only), with DHCP, DNS and fixed addresses.
• Network segmentation/isolation with VLANs and Port forwards for homelabs, SMBs and Enterprises use-cases.
• Firewall per network: enforced on the host Mac with pf, so you can build an isolated lab or put a router VM in front of others.
• Also supports FreeBSD and appliances to run as virtualized routers, load-balancers and virtual network function (VNF). We also did a PoC by building an ARM64 + FreeBSD & pfSense-based Firewall+Router distro that works on MacVisor: https://github.com/yadvlabs/armsense

Probably, a world-first virtualization platform to bring host firewall, VLANs and network appliances for Macs.

More at: https://scaleninja.com/docs/macvisor/networking/

Seamless guest integration:

• `mvz shell` and `mvz exec` into any VM.
• Clipboard sharing, drag-n-drop file transfers and port tunnels.
• Clean shutdowns and restarts through the guest agent.
• Live guest info: addresses, disks and more. AI Sandboxes & MCP: disposable AI sandboxes, and letting your AI agent use the VMs you open to it over MCP. You connect and use AI models running locally on host Mac or one on the cloud. Refer more: https://scaleninja.com/macvisor/#ai-sandboxes

More at: https://scaleninja.com/macvisor/#features and https://scaleninja.com/docs/macvisor/overview/

Privacy: https://scaleninja.com/macvisor/#privacy

# Comparison

The following are all good tools for different people and most users:

• Parallels Desktop: very polished, and broader 3D support on Windows. It's subscription-first (Standard $99.99/yr, Pro $119.99/yr, Business $149.99/yr) and one-time is upwards of $199. MacVisor is $59 once, and adds per-network firewalls, VLANs and an always-on background service.
• VMware Fusion: free. It doesn't run macOS guests on Apple Silicon, and doesn't set up cloud images for you.
• UTM: free and open source, with QEMU for other CPU architectures, which MacVisor doesn't do. Guests are mostly set up by hand.
• Tart, VirtualBuddy etc.: great for macOS CI and macOS guests. MacVisor covers Linux, Windows and FreeBSD too, with a full GUI and networking.

MacVisor aims to compete more with Parallels Business and Enterprise class products, and attempts to fill the gap of the missing "Proxmox", or "vSphere ESXi", or "KVM" or "Hyper-V" for macOS.

Built for Mac as Infrastructure, MacVisor is targetted for professionals, developers, creators, power users and for server Macs and homelabs, and for SMBs and Enterprises.

More detailed comparisons: https://scaleninja.com/macvisor/vs/

# Price

• Free 30-day trial: every feature, no sign-up, no credit-card and no email required.
• Fair after the trial: your existing VMs keep working. A licence is only needed to add new VMs (create, clone, import).
• MacVisor 27 Pro: $59 one-time per Mac, with every 27.x update. Launch promo: $10 off using code "MVZ10". (with 14-day money-back guarantee)

There are also Business ($79/Mac/year) and Enterprise (quote based) options that offer premium and SLA backed support, training, customisation, design & deployment help.

Does it pay for itself? Yes, in most cases within days to a few weeks. Setting up one Linux, macOS or Windows VM by hand typically costs 30 to 60 minutes of hands-on time; with MacVisor it's a couple of minutes. There's a small calculator on the site to check with your own numbers: https://scaleninja.com/macvisor/#roi

Download and try it free: https://scaleninja.com/macvisor/

Docs: https://scaleninja.com/docs/macvisor/

Requirements: macOS 27 on Apple Silicon. Supported in 11 languages.

I'm around in the comments for questions, feature requests and bug reports. Thanks for reading!

The new touch screen MacBooks are going get a Dynamic Island (according rumors), I think more people will become interested in apps that bring a similar experience to existing Macbooks. I’ve tried several, and here’s my take

BoringNotch
A great free option. It covers the basics well, and for many people, that’s probably all they need

Droppy
I honestly don’t get the hype. To me, it feels overloaded with features I’d rarely use. I want an app that fits into macOS, and this feels like an attempt to squeeze an entire operating system into the notch

I’m also not a fan of how heavily it seems to borrow from other Mac apps. Much of it feels derivative, and the overall presentation gives me an AI generated impression rather than a distinctive identity. That’s my impression, not a claim about how it was actually built

I also have questions about extension security. If Droplets execute Swift code inside the main app’s process and inherit its permissions, what protects users from an untrusted extension accessing sensitive capabilities? I haven’t independently verified the implementation, so I’d like to see clear documentation about isolation and permissions before drawing conclusions

DynamicLake
What I value most is the balance between simplicity and useful features. The plugin marketplace also gives developers and power users room to extend and customize the app around their own workflows

Alcove
A great minimalist option. If you want a focused set of features and a simple experience, it’s worth considering

NotchNook
I noticed it’s receiving updates again and the price has come down. It doesn’t quite fit my workflow, but I can see why others enjoy it

My personal picks:

• Best free option: Boring Notch
• Best overall for my workflow: DynamicLake
• Best minimalist option: Alcove
• An alternative workflow: NotchNook

Those are the ones I’ve tried. If you’ve used others, I’d love to hear your thoughts

Who I am

I’m Leo Enin, the developer of Axiom and founder of Nuare Studio Inc. My LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/leopardsnow

Axiom website: https://aiaxiom.app

Problem

I went from Spotlight to Alfred to Raycast. I liked that keyboard-first way of using my Mac, but I couldn’t find a product that combined the launcher experience I wanted with my own AI models and a powerful AI agent for work. ChatGPT’s harness is not bad, but solving problems on my computer through it is too much. It’s way too bloated, and Claude is way too strict.

I also build things with AI, so I wanted the most capable builder I could access from the keyboard. Something that could work with files and apps, research, write code, create tools, remember context, and keep working toward a goal. And make it right. If I ask for the news, for example, it should make sure the news is properly researched, with the information presented in the right form and supported by credible sources. It should self-improve and be able to build its own skills, tools, and commands for the launcher.

So I built Axiom, mostly for myself, but I’d love it if you used it too.

What Axiom does

It starts with a launcher: search apps and files, calculate, or run a command. Press Enter or Tab, and what you typed goes to the agent. Press Shift-Enter and it'll search that in the browser.

The agent can work with files, supported apps, your screen and the web. It can write code, build reusable tools, create commands, and run automate tasks. You can connect your own AI providers (BYOK) or use local models on supported Macs (a few ways to do that: ollama, LM Studio or download).

The philosophy is simple: you should be able to ask your launcher to build the feature you need, then use it. There's no point to build different commands when everyone is individual: ask your software to build itself and improve - it should be able to do that. I want as little as possible standing between the idea and the working result.

Here’s an example from building Axiom. I needed to hide everything on my desktop to record a video, so I asked it to build a small app that toggles desktop icons. It did. Then I thought it would be more useful as a command inside Axiom. I asked it to add the toggle, and now I have my own command that does the same thing and can be bound to a keyboard shortcut. That’s the thing I wanted: idea, ask, use it, improve it.

Along the way, I also stopped needing several separate utilities. Keeping my Mac awake, dictation, and the file-shelf workflow I used Dropover for now live inside Axiom. It also includes clipboard history with text search inside images, notes, smart snippets and quicklinks.

Comparison

Raycast and Alfred are the obvious launcher comparisons. Both have great ecosystems of extensions and workflows. My reason for building Axiom: software should be adaptable, not predefined. Otherwise there will be Raycast v3 in a couple of years and so on. And it was also to bring my own models and an agent-driven workflow into that same launcher like experience.

For dictation and the file shelf, Wispr Flow and Dropover are examples of dedicated apps whose everyday functions I wanted in one place. Axiom covers those workflows, though I’m not claiming feature-for-feature parity with either. Caffeinate and other apps are just commands as well as other small apps - you can just describe what it needs to do and you have a new command in your launcher.

OpenClaw and Hermes are closer comparisons for the agent. OpenClaw felt too bloated for what I wanted, and I wanted stronger memory than I found in Hermes for my workflow. I’d rather you judge the results in the walkthrough and the app.

Pricing

- Free: the app, your own AI keys, local models on supported Macs (silicon).

- Optional Axiom Plus, US$15/month: (nothing paywalled and will not be) a hosted AI model for work (every day work, except heavy coding), ~600 minutes of cloud speech recognition, cloud voices, and real-time synchronization with up to 10 GB of encrypted sync.

- Optional AI credits: one-time purchases starting at US$5 plus tax. Purchased credits don’t expire.

Paid options are NOT necessary, effectively you can organize the same, it's a convenience only option.

Full pricing: https://www.aiaxiom.app/pricing

Demo

I recorded an eight-minute intro: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zhC-w6C1Lqk showing both the agent and the launcher, but it's just a very brief surface.

TL;DR

Axiom is a free Mac launcher with a powerful AI agent, support for your own models (BYOK), and the ability to build tools and commands you ask for (a concept of self improving software). I built it for my own workflow and wanted to make it accessible to others.

Roadmaps:

- Mobile apps (coming soon)

- Windows support

(request more here: https://www.aiaxiom.app/ideas)

Try Axiom: https://aiaxiom.app

I’m the developer of this one. Klipnok Ronin is a small menu-bar app that puts a ronin on your desktop. He treats your open windows as terrain.

What he does

• Walks along window tops and the screen edges.
• Shoots a grappling rope up to windows above him, then rappels up the side.
• Wall-jumps up walls and runs to the edge for a backflip.
• Rides a window when you drag it.
• Throws shuriken and kunai at obstacles.
• Trains when idle: sword kata, iaido quickdraw, whirlwind, jump kick and a few combos.
• Right-click him to send him to camp. He meditates until you left-click him.
• He answers to no master. Now and then he refuses an order AND he sulks when you pick him up.

Download: https://klipnok.com/ronin/

Enjoy!

Demo

I’m the developer of TapCard, a lightweight window switcher for macOS.

Problem

I often have lots of windows open while working, and finding a specific one can be surprisingly frustrating. Cmd + Tab isn’t always the most convenient way to navigate between multiple windows, especially when I need to find a particular document, browser page, or code editor.

Solution

I built TapCard to make window switching more visual. It turns your open windows into preview cards arranged along the edge of the Dock. Hover over a card to preview a window, then click to bring it to the front.

The cards rearrange dynamically as you move your cursor, overlapping naturally when there are lots of windows. TapCard also supports minimized windows and multiple displays, automatically following the Dock’s position.

It’s a lightweight menu bar app that stays out of your way, with 0% idle CPU usage and no data uploaded or transmitted.

Comparison

Instead of cycling through apps with Cmd + Tab or searching through overlapping windows, TapCard lets you visually find and switch to the exact window you want. I wanted something lightweight that fits naturally into the macOS workflow without taking up extra Dock space.

Price

[Free ]

[AppStore]

I’d love to hear your feedback, especially on the card animations and the overall window-switching experience.

Hi r/macapps, I’m the developer of Peek.

I built it for those quick checks that keep pulling you between apps and browser tabs.

Hold your hotkey to peek. Release to get back to what you were doing.

Your feeds, schedule, stats. All in one place.

Peek focuses on bringing websites and widgets together in a customizable overlay you can show by holding a hotkey, even over full-screen apps.

A few things Peek can do:

- Bring together websites, local HTML & built-in widgets (Calendar, Reminders, Timezone, with more coming)
- Work over full-screen apps
- Hide unwanted page elements
- Auto-refresh pages
- Remember scroll position
- Auto dark mode (experimental)
- Web extensions (experimental)

And more :)

Peek is a one-time purchase, currently free for a limited time ($0). No subscription.

Official website: https://peek.zone
Mac App Store: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/peek-see-what-matters-quick/id6746101534?mt=12

lmk what you’d put into your peek zone :)

Hey r/macapps 👋

I build Vehla, a single Mac app that replaces a lot of small utilities: command palette, clipboard history, window management, screenshots and recording, local AI, a dock, a notch, menu bar tidying and more. Version 9.0 just shipped, and I wanted to share what's new.

The thing I'm proudest of: memory

An "everything app" usually means a heavy one, so I spent this release on that. With everything running, Vehla now idles at around 180–300 MB. I've measured 176 MB on an M1 MacBook Air. and another user measured 131.4 MB on an M5 Macbook pro.

New features

- Doki (out of beta): a replacement dock with islands for apps, folders, stacks and widgets, window previews on hover, and every display supported
- Glide (out of beta): slide along a trackpad edge for volume or brightness, three- or four-finger clicks and swipes for actions, or draw a shape to run anything
- Launchpad is back: the classic full-screen app grid macOS 26 removed. Press Left ⌘ twice.
- Smart Reply: press a shortcut in Mail, Messages or Slack and it drafts a reply from the conversation on screen. It never sends anything itself.
- Teleprompter: follows your voice as you read, and is hidden from screen sharing and recordings
- Zoom & Draw: zoom into and annotate your screen while presenting
- Step-by-step guides from screen recordings: one picture and sentence per click, ready to paste into Notes or Word
- Gemma 4 Vision: local AI that can read your screenshots, fully on-device
- iCloud Sync, free for everyone, and Vehla for iPhone is in TestFlight beta
- Background sounds, AirPods battery and charging in the notch, a camera mirror before meetings, and plenty more

Smaller things people asked for

- Collapsible Settings sidebar, with setting descriptions behind an ⓘ to cut clutter
- Custom theme wallpapers now fill the whole window
- Saying "make a list" while dictating now just makes the list
- QuickGlass no longer pops up when you click the menu bar

Comparison

Vehla isn't trying to replace Alfred, Raycast, Magnet, Dropover, Amphetamine, Hidden Bar, or TextSniper individually.

The goal is to replace the collection.

If you're already using several of those utilities together, Vehla aims to bring much of that functionality into one native application with a consistent interface, while also adding built-in AI, notes, canvas, workflows, and local AI support.

Pricing : $29.99 USD lifetime. 7 day trial. Free updates. No subscription.

Privacy: local AI runs entirely on your Mac. iCloud Sync is end-to-end encrypted in your own private iCloud. Nothing is uploaded without you asking.

Happy to answer questions, and I'd love feedback, especially memory readings on your Mac (Settings › Memory shows a live breakdown).

Website: https://vehla.app/
Download: https://vehla.app/download
Docs: https://vehla.app/docs
Refund Policy: https://vehla.app/refunds.html
iOS Testflight: https://testflight.apple.com/join/G8peDyNY

Disclosure: I'm the developer. PastePlop is on the Mac App Store under a paid developer account, so I believe this is Tier 1.

Problem

Clipboard managers are a solved problem. Nothing in PastePlop is a new idea, and I'm not going to pretend otherwise. Every single feature below already exists in some other app.

My problem was that the features I wanted were scattered across several of them. One had the grid but not the categories. One had OCR but a cramped interface. Another had a menu bar accessory but no way to park a snippet on screen. So I built the one that has all of them with the UI, keyboard control, and details I wanted.

• A resizable grid, not a list. ⌘⇧V zooms a translucent grid over whatever you're in. A slider scales tiles from compact to comfortable.
• Saved categories. Drag a tile into a bucket for snippets, prompts, signatures, brand colors. ⌘1 is History, ⌘2 through ⌘9 are your categories.
• A floating palette (MiniPlop). An always on top tray of the clips you reach for constantly. It can also sit inline in the overlay, or drop down from the menu bar.
• Floating images and text snippets. Right click any tile and Float pops it into its own borderless resizable window. Two finger scroll fades it to 25% so a reference screenshot can sit over your work without blocking it.
• Multi-paste. Select several tiles, ⌘↩ pastes them all in sequence.
• Reverse paste. Same selection, pasted bottom to top. Useful more often than it sounds.
• Paste in whatever order you want. Tiles drag to reorder inside History, inside a category and inside MiniPlop, so you arrange the sequence first and then multi-paste it. You can also join a selection with a comma, comma plus space, or paragraph break instead of pasting them separately.
• OCR search. Screenshots are OCR'd locally with Vision, so searching a phrase you remember seeing finds the screenshot it was in. On device, no network, no key.
• OCR paste. Right click a screenshot and Paste as Text drops the recognized text instead of the image.
• Menu bar accessory. Left click for recent items or a custom list, right click for the standard menu. Or hide the icon entirely and live on the hotkey.
• A free iPhone and iPad companion. Turn sync on and your recent clips and your saved categories mirror through your own private iCloud database to a free companion app. Tap a tile to put it on your phone's clipboard. Search works there too, including the OCR text from screenshots. Off by default, and you pick what travels: text, images, categories, and recognized text in images are four separate switches.

Plus the usual: text, rich text, images, animated GIFs, files, and links with previews, hex colors as swatches, drag out to any app, drop onto Finder to get a real file, Pause Capturing and an ignored apps list for password managers.

Comparison

vs. Paste. Paste is very polished, and it still beats me on sync: it syncs between Macs, it's two way, and its iPhone app can capture what you copy on the phone. Where I think PastePlop wins is the overall feature set and UI and the price model. You get a scalable grid instead of a horizontal shelf, floating snippet windows you can park over your work, OCR search and OCR paste, reverse and joined multi-paste, and a one time price instead of a subscription.

vs. Maccy. Maccy is free, open source, and genuinely good at what it does, which is a fast keyboard list of recent text. If that's your whole need, use Maccy and keep your money. PastePlop is aimed at the case where your clipboard is full of screenshots and files rather than lines of text, and where you want to keep things permanently rather than just scroll back.

Version Differences

The Mac App Store build cannot paste for you. It's sandboxed, so it can't synthesize ⌘V into another app. Picking a tile copies it and you press ⌘V yourself. That also means no multi-paste and no reverse paste in the store build, though it can concatenate multiple items. The direct download and Setapp builds do the real paste, and they ask for Accessibility permission once in order to do it. Everything else (categories, MiniPlop, floats, search, OCR, drag and drop) is identical across all three. If multi-paste is why you're here, buy direct, not from the store.

Pricing & Availability

• Direct download, $10.00: https://bendansby.com/apps/pasteplop.html (notarized DMG, Sparkle auto updates, free trial)
• Setapp: https://setapp.com/apps/pasteplop (one time purchase through the Setapp Marketplace, not part of a Setapp membership)
• Mac App Store, $9.99: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/pasteplop-clipboard-grid/id6767925726
• iPhone and iPad companion, free: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/id6811947598
• Bundles: it's in a $20 Mac App Store bundle and a $40 direct download bundle with 29 other apps: https://bendansby.com/bundles.html

I'm the developer. Analog TV Simulator is on the Mac App Store, and 3.0 is out today.

Problem

Most "retro" filters paint scanlines, blur and noise over a finished picture, so the result looks like a filter rather than an old TV. I wanted the faults to come from the same places they came from on real equipment. I also wanted to simulate as much as possible of the Analog TV era (running magnets across the tube, Pay TV scrambling, messing with the controls of the TV, etc.)

What it does

The app encodes your picture into an analogue signal and decodes it again on your Mac's GPU, through a camera tube, the broadcast standard (NTSC, PAL, SECAM and others), tape, the receiver and a CRT. Colour bleed, dot crawl, tape noise and ghosting come out of that signal path instead of being drawn on. Input can be a camera, a video, a photo or a live capture of part of your screen. Output goes to a file, NDI or Syphon, so it works as a live source in OBS too.

What's new in 3.0

This is the biggest single release ever. It incorporates tons of feedback from earlier posts to this sub and elsewhere. We went out and found even more vintage documentation to make this the highest fidelity signal-domain simulation I'm aware of.

- The picture engine was rebuilt against the published broadcast standards. Every standard is sharper, and PAL no longer shows a fine dot pattern.

- Tape formats each reach their own resolution, and pause and search noise come from a modelled FM tape channel. That's the bar across the paused shot in the video.

- SECAM was rebuilt to the ITU standard.

- Camera tubes are truer: lag now leaves brighter trails behind lights. The night tram in the video is a vidicon.

- Presets sit at the top of the sidebar, and loading one keeps your camera or video playing.

- Fixes: the Screen Capture selection box can be dragged again, a missing Screen Recording permission is now explained, and sound stays in step after pause or fast forward.

Comparison

- ntsc-rs: free, open source and very good. It models the NTSC and VHS chain in the signal domain and runs as a standalone app or a plugin for Premiere, After Effects and Resolve. If you only need NTSC VHS on a video file in your editor, it's a great choice. Analog TV Simulator also covers PAL, SECAM and the other world standards, camera tubes and the CRT itself, and it works live: a camera or part of your screen in, NDI or Syphon out to OBS.

- CRT shaders such as crt-royale: they model the screen (mask, scanlines, glow) on the finished picture. They're fast and great for games, but there's no signal underneath, so nothing changes when you switch standard or tape format.

- Others & Inspiration: The web site acknowledges other related projects that were sources of inspiration. https://analogtv.net/acknowledgements

Pricing

$9.99 one-time for life on the Mac App Store, no subscription, no account, no tracking. All processing performed on your device. Does not need an internet connection at all.

NDI input/output is an optional in-app purchase for $0.00 at the moment. Purchase it to have it with the app forever even if the price changes.

Mac App Store: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/analog-tv-simulator/id6761325301

The video is my own footage from Vienna, Budapest and Sydney, run through the app. Happy to answer questions about how any of it works.

Problem

A lot of text on screen can't be selected. You see it in screenshots, slides in a screen share, scanned PDFs and paused videos. Some of it is also in a language I don't read well. These are the three ways I use the app every day:

• Grab text: press Control-Option-C and drag a box over the text, and it's on my clipboard. Line breaks are kept, so a list pastes as a list
• Translate a selection to English: copy the text and press Control-Option-S. For text I can't select, I press Control-Option-D and drag over it instead. The translation shows up in a small card right next to the text
• Translate subtitles: press Control-Option-P and drag over the subtitle line. A panel beside it shows each new line in English while the video keeps playing

Text recognition and translation both run on your Mac using Apple's own frameworks. There's no account and nothing gets uploaded.

Comparison

Live Text in macOS can copy text from images and paused videos, but only in apps that support it, and it doesn't keep up with subtitles while a video plays. This app works on anything you can see on screen, and a pinned area stays translated as the text changes.

Pricing

Free, with no in-app purchases. Needs macOS 26.4 or later.

Mac App Store: https://apps.apple.com/app/id6824170528

I made this because when I vibe-code, I sit for hours by my mac without moving.

With Chairtax, you set the interval, and when a break is due, Chairtax covers the screen, and it only disappear back once the webcam has counted your reps.

- You choose the movement: squats, jumping jacks, high knees, overhead reach, side bends or chair stands

- You choose how many reps (5 to 20) and how often (every 15 minutes to every 2 hours)

- Three levels of strictness: a card you can dismiss, a covered screen with a couple of skips a day, or no skips at all

- Counting runs on your Mac with Apple's Vision framework. No account, no analytics, no video saved or sent anywhere

It's $29.99 on the Mac App Store

There's also a direct version on chairtax.app for $29 that comes with a money-back challenge: do 100 reps on 16 of your first 30 days and you get your money back. Apple doesn't allow that kind of refund, so it's only on the direct version.

Happy to answer anything. I'd especially like to hear what would make you actually keep something like this switched on.

I've got 10 App Store promo codes for anyone who'll try it for a week and tell me honestly what they think. Comment and I'll DM you one.

Problem

Hey everybody!

I built Copy Haste because clipboard managers keep one long list of copied items and quickly finding what you're looking for becomes a chore.

What it is:

A clipboard manager that sorts everything you copy into Text, Code, Links, Files, Media and Colors columns.

• Code: Code is detected on-device and syntax-highlighted.
• Color: Detects 20+ color formats such as RGB, HSL, LCH, Lab, Oklch, Oklab, CMYK, even UIColor, NSColor and SwiftUI Color(). Pastes back in any format.
• Files: You can copy one file, multiple files or a whole folder and the app keeps the selection as a single item.
• Media: Image, video and audio files are automatically added to the Media column. Paste or drop them wherever you need.
• Pins: Frequently used items can be pinned for quick pasting.
• No adult content or passwords: keeps sensitive items out of your history, including passwords from password managers, adult links and any URLs you exclude.
• Panel size: Column view, Tab view and Compact view make the app fit in every corner.
• Link cleaning: Strips tracking params (fbclid, utm_, gclid…) from copied links.
• List / Grid view: Switches between a compact list and a visual grid layout.

Comparison

• Maccy: free, one searchable list. Copy Haste groups by type.
• Paste: subscription. Copy Haste is a one-time purchase.

Pricing

30-day free trial.

$6.99 one-time. No subscription. No account required.

Up to 3 Macs, all future updates, 14-day refunds. Or, you can keep using a limited free tier.
Requires macOS 26.

https://www.copyhaste.app

Privacy

Privacy: https://www.copyhaste.app/privacy
Terms: https://www.copyhaste.app/terms

About me

Portfolio: https://www.pirosca.com
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/marcelpi
Contact: [contact@copyhaste.app](mailto:contact@copyhaste.app)

Hey r/macapps!

We are excited to announce VirtualProg 2.18, introducing full support for Windows 11 ARM64 virtual machines alongside our existing macOS and Linux guest capabilities.

For those unfamiliar, VirtualProg is a native virtual machine manager for Apple Silicon Macs built directly on Apple’s Virtualization Framework. Version 2.18 brings deep Windows integration, 3D graphics acceleration, and rich guest management across desktop, mobile, and command-line interfaces.

🚀 What's New in VirtualProg 2.18

• Windows 11 ARM64 Support: Run Windows 11 natively alongside macOS with dynamic/fixed disks, automated VirtIO driver installation, and seamless setup.
• DirectX 12 Acceleration: Powered by Apple’s D3DMetal (Game Porting Toolkit) pipeline for 3D graphics performance and DirectX 12 support in Windows guests.
• Auto Resolution & Display: Real-time display resizing and resolution switching matching your Mac monitor.
• Bi-directional Clipboard: Seamless copy and paste of text, images & Files between macOS and Windows via VirtualProg integration.
• Full Virtualization Feature Set: Support for checkpoints, linked clones, live memory ballooning, and USB device passthrough.

Note: The only feature currently not available for Windows (when compared to what is provided in mac/linux) VMs is Serial Ports.

💡 PROBLEM

Traditional virtualization software often restricts VM administration to the host desktop machine while locking multi-device access behind costly annual subscriptions.

VirtualProg resolves this by providing built-in remote management capabilities (via a headless Web Dashboard, iOS app, and Android app) combined with a powerful command-line interface (vpvm (in wen, mac, ios & android). You get full control over your virtual environments whether sitting at your Mac or managing them remotely from a browser or phone.

⚖️ COMPARISON

💰 PRICING & LINKS

• Free Trial: A free trial version can be downloaded directly from the product page at makeprog.com.
• Mac App Store: The full version is available for a one-time purchase of $22.99 USD on the Mac App Store (No subscriptions). Download from AppStore
• Documentation: Check out the VirtualProg Windows Help Guide for detailed setup instructions.

We'd love to hear your thoughts, feedback, and test results in the comments below!

Problem

My 256 GB MacBook Air kept running out of space, and macOS only ever said "System Data". Disk analysers show what's big right now, but I wanted to know what changed. When I checked, I had 10.7 GB free and 31 GB of app caches, mostly Chrome and Spotify. I cleared Spotify's cache and 890 MB of it was back within a week.

DiskFox keeps a history of your storage. Each scan is compared with the last, so instead of one big number you get dated changes with the likely cause:

- What Changed: "Xcode added 9.7 GB on Wednesday", "Steam updated No Man's Sky, +12 GB"

- Storage map: your disk coloured by what grew this week, not just by size. Click any block to break it down

- System Data, explained: backup snapshots, Spotlight, caches, Apple Intelligence and more, each with when it grew

- External drives: each drive gets its own map and history (new in 1.3)

- "Came back" alerts when something you cleaned returns

- Games one by one, Largest Files, real app sizes, exact duplicates, a menu-bar panel

Cleanup is deliberately slow: nothing moves without a review, everything goes to the Trash first, and there's a history with Put Back. No "clean everything" button.

Comparison

- DaisyDisk: the best map of what's big right now. DiskFox's map is coloured by what grew, and it keeps the history, so it can tell you when something changed and warn you when it comes back.

- CleanMyMac: does much more (malware, updates, optimisation) and is a subscription. DiskFox only does storage, has no one-click clean, and is a one-time purchase.

- GrandPerspective / OmniDiskSweeper: free and good for a one-off snapshot. If that's all you need, use them.

Pricing

$10.99 / £8.99 / €9.99 once, for 2 Macs. No subscription. 14-day free trial of every feature, no card needed. 14-day refund.

https://diskfox.app

About me and the app

- Krishan Assi, solo developer in the UK. LinkedIn: [your LinkedIn URL]

- Contact: [support@diskfox.app](mailto:support@diskfox.app)

- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/krishan-assi-b29420419/

- Privacy Policy: https://diskfox.app/privacy · Terms: https://diskfox.app/terms

- macOS 14 or later, Apple silicon and Intel. Signed with my Developer ID and notarised by Apple. Not on the Mac App Store because the sandbox would block most of ~/Library, which is where this storage lives

- Privacy: no account. A few anonymous usage counts (first open, first scan, whether it was used that day), never files or file names, and you can turn them off in Settings › General

- I used AI coding tools for a large share of the code. I designed it, chose every storage rule and what's safe to remove, and test it on my own Macs

I'd really like to hear what it gets wrong or doesn't recognise on your Mac.

For context I was on WisprFlow for a long time and liked it a lot, but it's expensive so I eventually cancelled. MacOS Golden Gate supposedly has much better dictation but a) I'm on an M1 so don't get the newer version and b) I don't like how Mac dictation ends when you leave the app you started it in.

Anyway, after trying out a bunch of alternatives I landed on FluidVoice and I'm glad I did. It's free, open source, and works as well and as fast as WisprFlow, which is saying a lot.

Note: Apparently there's a scammer that appears higher in search results than the legit Fluid Voice does. I won't link their URL here, but be sure you're going to https://fluidvoice.com .

Disclaimer: I'm not affiliated with FluidVoice in any way, I just think more people should be aware of the free alternative.

rcmd is an app switcher built around the Right Command key. It's the first app that brought this idea of ⌘ Right Command+letter for instant app switching in 2021.

Instant app switching ⌘ rcmd + letter

This is the foundation of rcmd: I think of Mail, I press rcmd-M, it's instantly focused. It doesn't matter on what Space it is, if it's fullscreen or not, if it was minimized or hidden. The same key combo launches the app if it's not running.

Fuzzy launching ⌘ rcmd + type to search

If I want to launch Photos, I hold rcmd, type ph and it gets launched immediately. No need to Cmd-Space… wait for search bar… type… select… Enter… No need to pre-assign the key (although that remains a possibility, you can assign any combination of keys so it always launches or focuses the same app)

Fuzzy search inside windows ⌘ Cmd-Tab + type to search

I want to focus that browser window where I was reading about "iPhone Duo" but the window title doesn't have that in the name. I press Cmd-Tab, and while holding ⌘ Command I start typing duo and the text inside the window is matched.

⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯

Lenses ⌥ ralt + letters

This is the new thing worth talking about though. People have been asking for ability to search and focus browser tabs for years.

The rcmd Lenses system does that, and takes the idea a bit further by making it extensible.

A lens is a list of those things that rcmd can search and focus inside an app:

• browser tabs in Safari, Firefox, Chrome, Brave, Edge, Vivaldi, Arc
• terminal panes in Terminal, iTerm, Ghostty, kitty, tmux, zellij, herdr
• code projects that open in VS Code, Cursor, Zed, Sublime Text, Nova or Xcode
• System Settings panes, Downloads, GitHub repos, Reminders lists, Obsidian vaults

Everything is 2-3 keys away. I care about this part the most, I launch and focus some things so often that I don't want to pick things from an interface to get to them. Some of mine:

• ralt-sen focuses the Sentry tab with my app error reports, in whatever window or Space it is
• ralt-KD focuses the kitty pane with my dev server
• ralt-pj lists my code projects, pjcl opens Clop in VS Code
• ralt-ssh lists my servers, sshn connects to the NAS

Make a lens for anything with Claude or Codex

Coding agents are common nowadays so rcmd comes with an MCP server that can write a lens from a single one-line prompt. For example:

write an rcmd lens for the hosts in my ~/.ssh/config, with the prefix ssh

The agent reads rcmd's docs on lenses, writes and tests the script, then installs the lens, and it shows up in the switcher right away. It can be anything really:

• cmux panes
• Finder folders in ~/Invoices
• Figma projects
• Obsidian notes from one vault

If agents aren't your thing, you can still do it manually. Each lens is a folder in ~/.config/rcmd/lenses with a lens.yaml and usually a small script that lists the rows.

⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯

Favorites ⌥ ralt - =

Pressing ⌥ ralt - = on the current focused window, or while a row is highlighted in the switcher, will save it as a favorite.

This allows you to use the same ⌥ ralt - letter to instantly open specific web pages, PDFs, folders, projects, terminal tabs with specific commands.

⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯

Comparison with app switchers:

The Right Command idea caught on, and there are a few good apps built around it now. Each one is good at its own thing, it's hard to say one is best because the feature lines are blurier each day:

• Dory: like rcmd, but more mouse and UI centric. rcmd is more keyboard centric and focuses on making the UI unnecessary through use and learning. Very similar otherwise. $9.99 on the App Store
• Sxitch: this one started as an rcmd replacement, but seems to have pivoted into Cmd-Tab focus nowadays with radial UI support and animations. Uses "branching" for resolving same-letter app conflicts and app-window picking, while rcmd uses "fuzzy search". Free, with a $10 Pro that adds window picking
• LaunchPalette: the same Right Command shortcuts, can be nested (rcmd-M-A for Mail, rcmd-M-E for Messages) and can even run scripts. A bit more manual work than rcmd for the assignments, and no search, but solid otherwise.
• Applight: from the same developer, it reorders the apps by guessing the next one from the app you're in (code editor → terminal), so the likely pick is already on top. rcmd goes the other way and keeps each app on the same letter, so it can be deterministic.
• Leader Key: more of a general shortcut tree than an app switcher, a leader shortcut followed by keys that open apps, URLs or run commands, all set up by hand. rcmd doesn't need any setup for apps, but it also doesn't try to do everything else. Free and open source, the predecessor of Tuna

Comparison with generic launchers:

The biggest difference between rcmd and most launchers is that rcmd is laser focused on apps and windows, while launchers can do a lot more generic actions but are clunkier for app switching.

• Raycast: tabs, terminal sessions and projects come from separate extensions, so it's one command per app (Search Tabs, Search Kitty Tabs etc.) and then the search. Aliases can only be set on commands, so you can't give one tab an alias.
• Alfred: same idea through workflows, like sftabs for Safari tabs. Script Filters (Powerpack) are the closest thing to a lens.
• Spotlight on macOS 26 and 27: it has quick keys now, but only for actions and Shortcuts.
• Contexts and LaunchBar: they learn which result an abbreviation should pick, which is great, but Contexts only switches windows, and LaunchBar has tabs only through its Safari Tabs action.
• Tuna: learns aliases and has an agent skill for configuring it, so it's the closest one in spirit.

⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯

Pricing: Free for basic features, €15 for Pro features

App starts with a 14-day trial identical to a Pro licensed version. After 14 days, the app can be used indefinitely in Free mode where Pro features are disabled.

Pro license is a one-time purchase for up to 5 Macs.

• Pro: Lenses, Favorites, the window switcher, fuzzy search, Stages, instant Space switching
• Free: app focusing and launching by letter, app and window cycling, Space switching (with animation)

Link: https://lowtechguys.com/rcmd

⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯

Limitations:

• a lens can only list what the app exposes through AppleScript, a CLI or its files, so some things might not be searchable or focusable
• some apps are very slow to respond when listing their contents, so the lens might need to run less often to keep things responsive
• the Lens UI can be a bit confusing while I gather feedback and adjust it to meet user expectations, this might take a few updates to become intuitive enough out of the box
• ... to be updated based on questions in the comments

I make Mac apps on my own, from Hove. Verso, Skein, Lede and Nought are mine, and so is this one.

The first early build had everything in it. Testers said it was overwhelming. They were right, which was annoying. Most builds since have been me taking things away.

It's a niche app - if you are not planning to write a book, screenplay, short story, you probably won't need it but you might know someone in the niche space that likes to try new things, let them know.

Problem

A book is not one document. It's scenes, chapters, notes on people and places, research, and an editor who only uses Word. That usually lives in four apps and a folder called "book FINAL v2".

Verso Manuscript keeps it in one book. Write in scenes or as one long page, move things around as cards, keep research on a board beside the page. It brings in Scrivener 3 and Word projects without touching the originals, and makes the Word copy, PDF, EPUB and print file at the end.

Native, 68 MB, macOS 14 or later. Each scene is a Markdown file, so your words open without my app. No account, no tracking.

Comparison

Scrivener is very good. If it works for you, keep it. Honestly.

The difference: a new book starts nearly empty and tools turn up when it needs them. Your editor's tracked changes come back against your current text, even if you kept writing (still being checked). Readers without Word get a private link that opens in a browser.

The AI is optional and works like a librarian, not a co-author. Ask where something happens and it shows you the passages. It checks dates, names and ages, and researches with sources you can check. It's off until you connect your own provider or a local model, and you see exactly what gets sent before it goes.

It never writes your prose. There is a deliberately no "Write" button.

Pricing

Writing, Materials and search will stay free. Review and Make Ready will be paid, price not decided yet. For now everything is free during early access

.

Download: versomanuscript.app (notarised)

TestFlight: https://testflight.apple.com/join/4p7QVaVG

Tell me what's wrong with it. The last lot did, and it got better.

Hey everyone,

I've been building Resurf for almost a year now. My very first users came from this community, and a lot of your feedback has shaped what it is today. Really appreciate all the support!

Resurf started as a small widget for saving references and has grown into a personal library for images, bookmarks, notes, PDFs, videos, and more.

Earlier this year, I rewrote the entire app from Electron to native Swift. Since then, I've been focusing on performance, better ways to organize things, and making everything you collect more useful.

What's new:

• Similar Vibe: Open any capture and discover related things across your library, whether they're images, notes, bookmarks, PDFs, or videos.
• Semantic Search: Find things using natural language, like "that calm blue landing page", without remembering exact titles or keywords. Both features run locally on your Mac using an embedding model.
• AI Actions: Define your own instructions for how AI should process new captures. Extract specific context, generate tags, and automatically organize things into Spaces based on your preferences.
• Other improvements: Faster library scrolling, better peek experience, bulk capture, and lots of smaller UI refinements.

Why I'm building this:

As a design engineer, I've always collected inspiration and interesting things from around the web. But the problem is it's scattered across different apps. I always wanted personal library where i can quickly capture/organize things based on my taste.

I also think personal taste and the references we collect will become even more valuable in a world where AI makes creating things easier.

Resurf supports MCP, so your AI tools can access your library and use your saved references, research, and ideas as context. Instead of starting from scratch, they can work with things you've already collected.

Think of it as a personal library for you and your agents.

Comparison

Apps like Eagle, mymind, Raindrop, and Fabric are all great at different things. Eagle focuses on visual asset management, Raindrop on bookmarks, while mymind and Fabric offer more automated ways to collect and organize information.

I'm taking a slightly different approach with Resurf. It's a native, local-first library for all kinds of references, with private iCloud sync, flexible organization, and local AI features. You own your files, decide how things are organized, and can make your library accessible to other tools through MCP.

A few things about Resurf:

• Native Mac, iPhone, and iPad apps
• Local-first, with private iCloud sync
• Spaces, Areas, and tags for organizing
• Quick capture from anywhere on Mac
• One-time purchase, no subscription

Pricing: One-time purchase for the Mac app. Current plans:

• 2-year update plan: $39.
• Lifetime updates: $79.
• iPhone and iPad: free and unlimited.

Students: Email [support@resurf.so](mailto:support@resurf.so) from your school address for a discount.

Website: https://resurf.so

Changelog: resurf.so/changelogs

There's still a lot to improve. I'm shipping updates regularly and continuing to polish the experience.

Would love to hear what you think about these new features and what you'd like to see next.

Thanks again for all the support!

Hi [r/macapps](r/macapps), I'm Sam, a solo developer and business owner from the Netherlands!

I used CleanShot X for years. And it's a good app, but it never quite fit how I work. Features I kept wishing for weren't there, and on my (5yo) Mac it often felt slow at times. So I started building the screenshot app I actually wanted. I've used it every day since, and now it's ready for other people: Shotbolt.

The problem

My screenshots kept turning into small jobs: blur an email address, fix a typo before sharing, copy a table out of a dashboard, explain a bug in five steps. Every one of those meant a second app or doing it by hand.

What it does that I couldn't find anywhere else

• Retype the text inside a screenshot
• Screenshot or record a single element: hover a button, card or table row and click
• Translate a screenshot into another language
• Hide sensitive information automatically
• Turn your clicks into a step-by-step guide
• Copy a table from a screenshot as real rows and columns
• Search the text in all your screenshots, locally on your Mac
• Auto-captions in recordings, generated on-device

Plus the everyday stuff

Area, window, full screen and scrolling capture, a full annotation editor, text and QR capture, pins, recording and GIFs with an editor, and Shortcuts actions.

Compared to CleanShot X

Shotbolt imports your CleanShot shortcuts, export folder and after-capture actions on first launch, so switching takes a minute. The screenshot side is free, and Pro is a one-time purchase.

Pricing

• Free, forever: area, window and full-screen capture, the annotation editor, text capture (OCR, QR codes), pins and searchable History.
• Pro: $9.99 once (launch price until Dec 31, then $15), or $17.49 for 2 Macs. Adds recording and GIFs, scrolling capture, element capture, automatic redaction, the Apple Intelligence features and Shortcuts actions.
• Every install starts with 7 days of Pro, then drops to Free. Nothing you made is lost.
• 14-day refund, no questions asked. No subscription.

Good to know

• Requires macOS 26 or later
• No analytics, no crash reporting. The only network request is the license check.
• Signed and notarized

Download here: shotbolt.app

50 free years of Pro

Comment with the screenshot app you use now and the one thing that annoys you about it. I'll DM the first 50 people a key for a free year of Pro. After the year it simply becomes Free. All I ask in return is your honest feedback.

ALL 50 PROMO CODES HAVE BEEN DISTRIBUTED. You can still hit me up in DM for a limited time discount.

Contact: [support@shotbolt.app](mailto:support@shotbolt.app) Privacy LinkedIn Terms

After updating Mac 27.2 (26B123), can fingerprint recognition be detected when downloading apps from the App Store?

Problem

I copy and paste all day, and I wanted a clipboard manager that lives in the notch, out of the way until I need it. There are notch apps and there are clipboard managers, but I couldn’t find one that did the whole thing. 

So I built CopyPasta. Hover over the notch (or press ⌃⌘C from any app), start typing, and your whole history is right there. Everything it stores is encrypted with AES-256, including the iCloud copy, with the key in your Keychain. Nothing is ever saved unencrypted.

Comparison

The dedicated clipboard managers don't use the notch. Paste is the closest to what I wanted, and its Paste Stack is great, so I built my own version of it. But I also wanted things none of them combined: saving screenshots straight into the history, beautifying them with presets for X, Instagram and LinkedIn so they're ready to share, OCR to search the text inside them, and everything encrypted on disk.

CopyPasta features:

• Opens from the notch, or from anywhere with ⌃⌘C
• Everything encrypted on disk (AES-256), including the iCloud sync
• Passwords, API keys and tokens detected and hidden automatically; Touch ID to reveal after 10 minutes
• Copies marked private by 1Password, Bitwarden or Apple Passwords are never saved
• Paste Stack: copy several things in a row, then paste them back in order
• Multi-copy: select several clips and paste them all at once
• Text, images, screenshots, files, and true vectors (shapes from Photoshop/Affinity stay crisp)
• OCR on every screenshot, so you can search and copy text inside images
• Beautify: turn screenshots into polished images with presets for X, Instagram, LinkedIn and more
• Colors show up as swatches, with a color wheel and matching palettes
• Custom categories where clips are kept forever
• Full keyboard control
• iCloud sync and Apple Intelligence summaries
• Native macOS app (macOS 15+)

Pricing

From $15, one-time. No subscription, lifetime updates. Free 7-day trial with every feature unlocked.

Website: https://usecopypasta.com

Problem

Ring shut down its desktop app in 2023 and never replaced it. If you want your Ring cameras on a Mac today, you must use a browser tab that logs you out frequently, shows 4 cameras max, and has none of the things a Mac app should have. No notifications, no menu bar previews, no widgets, no window you can float over your work.

What it does

Video Wall Live is a native Mac app (Swift, Apple silicon & Intel, macOS 14+). Here's what it does

• Every Ring camera and doorbell live in one window. Grid or featured layout, or group cameras however you like
• Live view stays up as long as the window is open. No timeout, no re-login
• Open a camera in its own window and float it on top of what you're working in, or Picture in Picture
• Doorbell rings and the camera pops up with sound. Person, package and vehicle notifications
• Snooze alerts from the menu bar, or set daily Quiet Hours and custom rules for all cameras or just some of them
• Menu bar panel with live thumbnails and recent activity
• Desktop widgets for one camera or the whole wall
• Your second monitor can become a Wall Display with widgets (clock, weather, activity) and Auto-Cycle through cameras
• Keyboard shortcuts and Shortcuts actions

Your video stays private. We never see it or store it, and we don't track what you watch or sell your data.

Comparison

• ring.com in a browser is free and works anywhere, but 4 cameras, live view times out, frequent logouts, no notifications or native features. Video Wall Live shows all cameras continuously with notifications, menu bar, widgets and PiP.
• Homebridge / Scrypted with the Ring plugin are free and very flexible if you like tinkering, and they can feed HomeKit, which we can't. They need a server running 24/7 and setup time. Video Wall Live is a 2-minute install with nothing to run at home and nothing to maintain.
• You could mirror the Ring app from your iPhone to your Mac, but that's one camera at a time and your phone is stuck while you do it.

Pricing

• It's a third-party app in the Ring Appstore, so Ring requires an active Ring Protect plan on your account
• 30-day free trial, then $1.99 per camera per month, billed through your Ring account. Ring only supports monthly per-camera billing in its Appstore, so there's no flat or lifetime plan yet. You pay for the cameras you connect, not the ones you own
• Why a subscription and not a one-time price. It isn't just a local app, there are ongoing cloud costs
• The Ring Appstore is currently available to US Ring accounts only. Hopefully Ring will be rolling it out outside the US soon, and Video Wall Live will be there when it does
• One subscription covers up to 10 devices across every platform we support. Mac, Apple TV, Fire TV, Google TV / Android TV, Roku, Windows and the web app. Pay per camera once, use it on every screen in the house

Mac App Store https://apps.apple.com/us/app/video-wall-live-desktop/id6817043384

Ring Appstore (where the trial starts) https://ring.com/pages/appstore/video-wall-live

Site and setup guides https://videowalllive.com

Disclosure, this is our app. Happy to answer anything, and feature requests and bug reports are welcome.

Hi everyone. I’m the developer of Captain’s Deck, a dual-pane file manager for macOS. The video is the real app captured on my Mac (demo folder, no mock-ups).

Problem

Finder is fine for browsing but slow for moving files around, working with servers, or doing developer stuff. I kept switching between Finder, Terminal an FTP client and a diff tool, so i built one app that does all of it with focus on the keyboard for speed.

The app was originally released back in February and it now has reached a point that it's really strong against all of the competition. Thanks to the user base feedback!

What it does

• Two panes with tabs, F-key shortcuts (F5 copy, F6 move…), Vim-style navigation, Quick Open for files and commands
• Built-in terminal inside the window that follows the active pane, including into SSH sessions when you’re on a server
• Git status letters on every file, stage and commit from the app, side-by-side visual diff with merge
• SFTP, FTP, S3 (and S3-compatible), WebDAV, SMB, AFP, NFS, Google Drive, OneDrive, Dropbox
• Preview pane, folder sync, disk usage analyzer, archive browsing, JavaScript plugins
• Themes: Modern, Paper, Bridge, plus Norton Commander and Midnight Commander for the nostalgic
• Tons of more features and details that you can read about on the site or try out.
• Native Swift + AppKit, macOS 14+, universal binary

Comparison

ForkLift 4: very good for servers and sync, but its terminal opens an external app and its compare hands off to FileMerge or another tool. Captain's Deck has both build in.

Commander One: the terminal and cloud connections need the PRO pack and there's no Git. Captain's Deck includes all of that in one price.

Price: €19.99 once with lifetime updates (Team: €69.99 for 5 Macs). 14-day free trial, no account needed and it's fully unlocked. Also on the Mac App Store, Setapp and Homebrew. (MAS has some differences that you can read about on the website)

About the comparison table in the video: I checked every cell on each vendor’s site in October 2026. Half-marks mean a paid tier, an add-on or partial support. If I got something wrong about ForkLift, Commander One, Path Finder, QSpace or Marta, tell me and I’ll fix it.

I'd honestly love it if you gave a chance to the trial. Happy to answer questions, and feature requests are welcome.

https://captains-deck.com

Mac App Store