Great programs that I enjoy

March 23rd, 2024

A screenshot of Launchpad on macOS David Hepworth

Great programs that I enjoy

I always enjoy sharing with others some of the apps that I’ve discovered during my time as a MacOS user. Many of these apps were important reasons for me to shift from Windows to Mac. This is a rather exhaustive but not complete list of programs for Apple devices that I recommend. There may be Windows variants of these programs, but I don’t use them and can’t guarantee their quality.

Programs listed below in italics are my favorite favorites.

⚠️ This list was last updated October 3, 2024.


🎼 Audio

  • Albums — Music player with a focus on full-album listening
  • Albums: Music Shortcuts — Widget app to immediately play a selected favorite album
  • AudioKit Reverb — A GarageBand plugin for reverb
  • Audio Trimmer — A simple audio trimming tool for mobile devices
  • Finale — A better Last.FM audioscrobbler
  • Hark — Podcast clip browser
  • Hokusai — Mobile audio editor
  • King of FM — FM synthesizer
  • LE01 — Synthesizer for bass sounds
  • Marvis Pro — Music player with advanced listening tools and features
  • Mimi — Hearing test and audiogram creation for AirPod customization
  • Minimoog Model D Synthesizer — A remake of a classic synthesizer
  • Miximum — Playlist authoring for combining official Apple and user-generated playlists
  • myNoise — Noise cancellation through walls of sound
  • Outcast — Podcast player for Apple Watch
  • Panflow — Panning plugin for GarageBand
  • PaulXStretch — Extreme sound length distortion
  • Pitch Drift — Pitch shifting plugin for GarageBand
  • PlayTally — Apple Music listening statistics
  • Podcast Archiver — Download backups of podcasts via RSS feed
  • Podcast Saver — Mobile backups of podcasts via RSS feed
  • Shazam — Music identification via live microphone recording
  • SLEEP — Calming space scenes and beautiful music for relaxation and focus
  • Sleeve — Album art as a HUD for easy listening on Macs
  • Soor — Music player with stat tracking
  • SoundHound∞ — An alternative to Shazam, with the supposed ability to recognize humming
  • Thwip — Fun sound effect generator for mobile devices
  • VHS Synth — A gritty, warbly synthesizer
  • 808 Overdrive Pro — A synthesizer with a focus on bass sounds

👨🏻‍💻 Development

  • Applite — A user interface for the popular package manager, Homebrew
  • Boop — Various useful scripts for development
  • CodeEdit — A basic text editor to manage simple tasks
  • Coteditor — A more Mac-minded version of Notepad++, a popular Windows text editor
  • Cork — A well-engineered user interface for Homebrew
  • DevCleaner for Xcode — A utility to clean out data from Xcode installs
  • DevToysMac — A port of the popular script tool for Windows
  • Entity Pro — A helpful browser for all glyphs available on macOS
  • Favicon Factory — A simple UI to build favicons for websites
  • Gapplin — An SVG image viewer
  • GitHub Desktop — A helpful UI for managing Git
  • Jayson — A JSON viewer for mobile devices
  • Nova — A beautiful, performative IDE built only for Macs
  • One Markdown — A feature-rich Markdown editor and viewer
  • Textastic — A cross-platform text editor
  • Visual Table — A UI for databases
  • Zavala — A helpful outline builder for writing blog posts

👨🏻‍🎨 Graphic Design

  • Affinity Designer v2 — An incredibly powerful yet affordable alternative to Adobe Illustrator
  • Affinity Photo v2 — A popular alternative to Adobe Photoshop with an ingenious UI for managing various graphic design tasks
  • Affinity Publisher v2 — A wise choice for Adobe InDesign users who wish to avoid a subscription fee
  • Afterlight Photo — A helpful set of filters and overlays for iPhone photography
  • ColorSlurp — A color sampler and UI palette builder
  • Darkroom — A well-made Apple Photos companion for photo and video editing
  • Fontcase — A tool to use custom fonts in certain apps on an iPhone
  • ImageOptim — A must-have image compressor for web development
  • Inkscape — A vector image editor with great drawing tools
  • Linea Sketch — A good and simple drawing tool
  • Magic — Useful for signing PDFs with the Magic Trackpad
  • Paletter — A UI palette builder
  • Photomator — A powerful AI-powered photo editor that links to Apple Photos
  • Pixelmator — A great raster-based image editor for mobile devices
  • Pixelmator Pro — A useful tool for quick raster-based edits
  • Procreate — A powerful and comprehensive drawing tool for iPad
  • PureRef — A helpful mood board builder for creative work
  • Retrospecs — Fun vintage computer image processing emulator
  • VSCO — My favorite image editor for digital photography, filled with beautiful filters and a powerful toolset

💻 Mac Menu Bar Tools

  • AltTab — Emulate the Windows Alt+Tab UI for easier program management
  • Amphetamine — Temporarily keep the computer on without editing power management settings
  • Amphetamine Enhancer — Additional features for Amphetamine that can be helpful in some cases
  • Command X — Adds the ability to “Cut” files in Finder
  • Dropover — A little bucket to hold files when transferring between folders
  • FinderFix — Quickly resizes and centers new Finder windows so that they don’t scatter across the screen when opened
  • Gamepad Menu — Adds support in macOS for MFi gamepads
  • Hand Mirror — Opens a small preview window of the active camera on macOS
  • Ice — Hides the excessive amount of applications I run in the Menu Bar
  • Lasso — Grid-based program window management
  • Mac Mouse Fix — Adds mouse settings for external mice to customize the experience from the Magic Trackpad
  • Magnet — Program window management with window snapping features
  • Mission Control Plus — Allows for the closing of programs while in Mission Control
  • MonitorControl — Management of external monitors through a UI
  • Pelican — Clipboard manager; lists a history of the contents of the clipboard for easy retrieval
  • Screenfloat — A tool to make and overlay screenshots over other programs
  • Shottr — A useful screenshot tool with a variety of helpful features

🚶🏻‍♂️‍➡️ Outdoor Activity

  • Distance — A UI for tracking distances on Google Maps
  • Easy Price Compare — A quick comparison tool for weights, prices, and quantities
  • EPA AIRNow — Current readings of outdoor air quality
  • EPA Smoke Sense — Pollutant level measurement of outdoor air
  • LastQuake — Worldwide tracking tool of earthquakes; includes self-reporting tool
  • Merlin Bird ID — A tool to discover and catalog local birdlife
  • OSHA-NIOSH Heat Safety Tool — Helpful guide on the safety of outdoor activity
  • Organic Maps — A good offline mapping tool for biking and hiking
  • Seek — An AI-powered plant identification program
  • SkyView® — Constellation tracker with a camera overlay for easy identification of stars in the sky
  • Stocard — Membership/loyalty card wallet for stores that don’t use Apple Wallet
  • Streets — Open Google Street View from a shared Apple Maps location
  • WaterMinder — Track water intake throughout the day to avoid surprise dehydration
  • what3words — A grid-based offline tracking tool for hikers who might get lost with insufficient cellular coverage
  • Where To? — An alternative to Yelp for planning an activity

📸 Photos

  • Clips — A fun video maker useful for iMessage sharing
  • GIF Toaster — A quick tool for building GIF images on a mobile device; handy for sharing on iMessage
  • Green Screener — A quick preview of green screen coverage for later importing on a video editor
  • Halide Mark II — A powerful alternative to the default camera app on iPhone
  • LP — Quickly generate a GIF or video of a Live Photo
  • NeuralCam — Use AI to (overly) process an image taken on a mobile device
  • Peek-a-View — Build an album of photos that can be safely shared with someone else
  • Photoscope — A comparison tool to cull photo collections
  • Pixea — A robust image presentation program
  • Pixel Art Camera — A silly camera tool that makes images look like they were taken on an old device
  • Queryable — A more comprehensive AI-powered image search
  • Slow Shutter Cam — A camera for taking long-exposure images
  • Spectre Camera — A powerful long-exposure camera program
  • This — A simple UI for highlighting sections of an image with a refined result
  • VSCO — A very powerful image editor with a camera app included that has some unique overlays included

🛠️ Shortcuts

  • Charty — Build charts through Apple Shortcuts
  • Data Jar — A database for other shortcuts such as App Wishlist Pro
  • Opener — A tool to directly open supported links into apps
  • Scriptable — Write scripts on and for mobile devices
  • Toolbox Pro — Adds additional functionality not available in Apple Shortcuts

🧰 Utilities

  • 4K Video Downloader+ — Download videos from a variety of sites with a simple UI
  • AppCleaner — Deletes extra files not properly culled after moving an app to Trash
  • Atlas Wallpaper — Generate interesting wallpapers using maps of cities
  • BetterDisplay — Adds additional features to monitors that might be hidden by software settings
  • Brush — An Apple Watch app that connects to HealthKit to time toothbrushing sessions
  • Calibre — Robust eBook creator
  • Callsheet — A better UI for IMDb and other movie sites
  • DaisyDisk — Displays file space used as a pie chart for easy drive management
  • Encrypto — Encrypt files for sharing with others
  • Equinox — Wallpaper designer for automatic day/night image changes
  • FlickType — Type out messages on an Apple Watch
  • HiDock — Customize the dock behavior based on the amount of monitors connected
  • Keka — A useful file or folder compression app
  • Latest — Pings the supported programs on a macOS device for updates
  • Lulu — A firewall for Macs
  • Mela — A cross-platform recipe management tool with calendar, grocery list, and search tools
  • Pipper — Presents a Safari overlay on top of all other windows
  • Quitter — Idle aplication management
  • Screens — A remote management tool with a great presentation
  • Sigil — Ebook creation tool
  • Sloth — Shows all files and sockets in use on a Mac
  • Sniffnet — A network monitoring tool
  • Stapler — Open multiple programs and files simultaneously, based on a goal or purpose.
  • Transmission — Bittorrent client
  • Unblah — Tracks the amount of time one speaks during a conference call to ensure one doesn’t monopolize a conversation

🎥 Video

  • Blackmagic Camera — A comprehensive and powerful video recording app
  • DaVinci Resolve — A powerful video editor
  • Emulsio — Image stabilization
  • IINA — A video player with a pleasant UI
  • Infuse — A useful video player
  • Lossless Cut — A non-destructive video file editor
  • LumaFusion — A good video timeline editor when used on mobile devices
  • Motion — Apple’s motion graphics tool
  • Unsqueeze — Video scaling application

🌐 Web Browsing

  • AdGuard Pro — Ad blocking tool for Safari
  • Firefox — Less popular these days, but still good enough to become one’s default web browser
  • Goodlinks — A tag-based read-it-later link-saving app with iCloud backup
  • Hack — A friendly UI for the Hacker News forums
  • KeePass XC — A Mac client for the KeePass encrypted password and secure notes file format
  • KyPass — A mobile UI to open a KeePass file, with iCloud support
  • MiniWiki — Wikipedia on an Apple Watch
  • Mlem — A better UI for the Lemmy platform
  • Mona — A superb Mastodon universal client
  • NetNewsWire — A universal RSS reader built on Apple design principles
  • Orion — A web browser built on WebKit that supports Firefox, Chrome, and Safari extensions
  • Parrity — A web browser for the Apple Watch
  • Parrot — A helpful quotation graphic tool to share links and quotes from online sources
  • Play — A universal app offering a better Save for Later experience on YouTube
  • Re:Toot — Generate images of text from Mastodon posts for sharing
  • Reversee — Reverse image lookup tool
  • Tailor — Connect multiple screenshots into one file, useful for when the existing functionality in a mobile device doesn’t support the use case
  • Watch Feeds — RSS feed reader for Apple Watch

Chromium Extensions

Firefox Extensions

Safari Extensions