Deep work
Start a session, mute the noise, keep the Mac awake — without leaving what you're doing.
- Pomodoro Timer
- Focus Mode
- Keep Awake
- Quick Notes
Free forever · 100% native · macOS 13 Ventura+
Notchy — Dynamic Island for your Mac.
Notchy turns the notch into a fluid Dynamic Island — music, clipboard, timers, AI usage, and HUDs. Native, light as air, and completely free.
v1.0.122 · Updated August 19, 2026 · Try the live demo →
No notch? Notchy floats the same island as a pill — MacBook Air, iMac, Mac mini, Mac Studio, and external displays all work.
Notchy — Live Preview
Notchy
9:41
Psst… it's interactive.
- 3,876installs
- 4.34★from 207 ratings
- 318active today
- 134languages
- ~0%idle CPU
Real screen recordingsSee every feature.
See every feature.
In action.
Hover a card to preview — click to watch full-screen.Tap a card to watch it full-screen.
FeaturesEverything you need.
Everything you need.
Built right in.
All 72 features in one lightweight native app. No subscriptions. No bloat.
Now Playing
Spotify and Apple Music controls with album art, scrubbing, shuffle and repeat, app-volume, and one-tap Favorite in Apple Music — plus playback speed for video playing in Chrome, Brave, Edge, Vivaldi or Safari, all from a collapsed now-playing island on the notch.
AI Usage Tracker
Track Claude Code, Codex, Cursor, and Copilot rate-limit windows, tokens, and cost from the notch — from local CLI logs or a provider API key (stored in the Keychain), with alerts before you hit a limit. Choose which provider sections appear, and in what order.
Command Palette
Press ⌃⌥K anywhere and type — jump to any tab, toggle Caffeine, start a timer, or run a Shortcut. Every Notchy action is one keystroke away, with ⌘1–9 tab switching built in.
Knock to Control
Tap your trackpad — or knock the chassis — to open the notch, the Shelf, Clipboard, Caffeine, or play/pause. Single, double, and triple taps each run their own action, with an adjustable sensitivity and typing protection so it never false-fires. A double-tap-a-key mode works on any Mac too.
Menu Bar Detach
Pop any tab — Clipboard, Timer, AI Usage, Cuely — out of the notch and into a standalone menu-bar popover, plus a one-click Caffeine toggle right beside the clock.
Clipboard History
Every copy lands in a scrollable history shelf inside the notch, with smart actions for links, colors, and emails. Pin favorites to keep them forever — pins survive the cap and even Clear.
Zoom Teleprompter
Cuely scrolls your script right beneath the webcam inside the notch, keeping your eyes perfectly aligned for Zoom calls.
System HUDs
Replace bulky macOS overlays. Volume, brightness, and caffeine toggles animate fluidly out of the notch — and Notchy can even hide the stock macOS HUD entirely, including on macOS Tahoe.
AirPods Manager
Detect nearby cases, show per-bud battery, and connect with one tap. A beautiful iOS-style experience on Mac.
Pomodoro Timer
Run focus sessions directly from the notch — with session chaining, a stopwatch, streaks, and a 7-day focus chart. A beautifully animated countdown keeps you on track.
Menu Bar Calendar
A fast, native calendar widget that drops down from the notch. See upcoming events from iCloud, Google, or Exchange.
Camera Mirror
Quickly check your appearance before joining a video call. A high-quality local camera feed instantly drops down.
Hide the Notch
Hide the Mac notch by turning the menu bar black, while keeping all your Dynamic Island tools active.
100% Native
Built purely in SwiftUI. Blazing fast, zero battery drain (~0.1% CPU), and perfectly tuned for Apple Silicon.
Liquid Glass UI
A premium, Apple-like Liquid Glass aesthetic built purely in SwiftUI — and a resizable panel: set the expanded island's width and height with a live preview.
Quick Notes
Jot a thought straight from the notch without switching apps. Notes drop into the pill instantly and stay there until you're done.
File Shelf
Drag files onto the notch to stash them, then drag out wherever you need. Shelf items survive quits and relaunches — the fastest clipboard for files.
Keep Awake
One tap from the pill keeps your Mac awake — indefinitely, for a set duration, or until a clock time you pick. Auto-disables so you never forget.
Live Weather
Local temperature and conditions on the Home tab, updated automatically. No extra app or widget needed.
Focus Mode
Notchy detects when Focus changes and shows a compact island — and while DND is on, low-priority alerts stay quiet so only what matters shows.
Battery HUD
A compact live activity replaces macOS's chunky low-battery alert. See charge level and charging state right on the notch.
Synced Lyrics
Time-synced lyrics scroll under the notch as your song plays — Apple Music, Spotify, anything Now Playing. Free, via LRCLIB.
Apple Reminders
Capture a reminder and see what's due without leaving your work. Syncs to real Apple Reminders through iCloud.
Image Converter
Drop a photo on the shelf and convert HEIC, PNG, JPEG, TIFF or PDF — fully offline, drag the result straight back out.
Audio Switcher
Switch sound output — speakers, AirPods, monitor — with one tap from the notch. No diving into System Settings.
Device Battery
Magic Mouse, Keyboard and Trackpad charge, right next to your AirPods — plus third-party Bluetooth headphones and speakers. Every wireless device at a glance.
Download Alerts
A clean island pops the moment a download lands in your Downloads folder — Reveal in Finder with one tap. Works with every browser, no extension.
Apple Shortcuts
Run your Apple Shortcuts straight from the notch — a colorful grid of one-tap chips with live run feedback. No Shortcuts app, no menu digging.
Zip & Unzip
Select files on the shelf and compress them into a Finder-friendly zip — or expand an archive — without ever opening Finder. Powered by native ditto.
Screenshot Shelf
Every screenshot you take is auto-staged on the notch as a draggable island — drop it into a chat or doc without hunting the Desktop.
Drive Eject
Plug in a USB drive and an island pops with a one-tap Eject. A clean 'Safe to disconnect' confirms when it's done.
App Launcher
Pin your go-to apps to a Launcher tab in the notch and open them with one tap. Add from a picker, drag to reorder — your dock away from the Dock.
Window Snapping
Drag any window up to the notch and snap zones appear in the island — release to tile it left, right, halves, or full screen. Rectangle-style tiling with the notch as the drop target.
Text Snippets
Save addresses, replies, and code blocks as reusable snippets, then paste them from the command palette — a TextExpander-style expander, free, with clipboard history untouched.
OCR & Search
Copy a screenshot and Notchy reads the text out of it — fully on-device via Apple Vision. Clipboard search even matches words inside your images, so any past copy is a few keystrokes away.
Screen Capture
One tap opens the familiar macOS region selector — the shot lands on the clipboard for instant paste or OCR and on the shelf as a PNG you can drag anywhere.
Color Eyedropper
Sample any pixel on screen with the system magnifier — the hex code is copied instantly and surfaced as a color island. No screen-recording permission needed.
Mic Mute
One system-wide mute that silences you in every meeting app at once — Zoom, Meet, Teams — by muting the input device itself via CoreAudio. No per-app buttons to hunt.
Keystroke HUD
Present or record with your shortcuts on screen — every keypress surfaces as an island in the notch, right where your audience is looking. Password fields are never captured.
Keyboard Cleaning Lock
Lock every key so you can wipe your keyboard without typing garbage — a countdown island shows the state, and ⌘⎋ unlocks instantly.
Menu Bar Icon Hiding
Declutter the menu bar Bartender-style: ⌘-drag icons past the separator to hide them, tap the chevron to reveal. No private APIs, no extra app.
System Stats
Live CPU, memory, and network readouts one tap from the notch header — a glanceable iStat-style flyout without another menu-bar icon.
GitHub PRs
Your open pull-request count in the notch — a lightweight poll with a Keychain-stored token, one tap to github.com/pulls. A developer surface no other notch app has.
Call Island
Incoming FaceTime and phone calls surface as an iPhone-style island on the notch — see who's calling and answer or decline without hunting the notification. Teams, Zoom and WhatsApp calls get their own island with a running duration, instead of being mistaken for music.
Stocks Ticker
A watchlist that lives in the notch: live prices with the day's chart, a ticker that rotates through the symbols you pin to the collapsed pill, and an alert when a stock rises above or falls below a price you set. Pre-market, after-hours and closed are labelled, so a price you cannot act on never sits there pretending to be live.
Notch Terminal
A real VT100/xterm terminal lives in its own notch tab — colors, cursor keys, TUI apps all work, since it's a login shell in a PTY, not a command box. Switch tabs without killing the running shell.
Desktop Widgets
Drag AI Usage, Activity rings, or a running Timer onto the desktop or into Notification Center. Native WidgetKit widgets, refreshed in the background — no HTML, no geeklets, no refresh interval to tune.
Agent Approvals
When Claude Code is genuinely blocked on a permission, an Allow/Deny island appears on the notch and your answer goes straight back through the hook. Answer it in the terminal instead and the island clears itself.
Privacy Indicator
A notch-native pill lights up the instant any app's camera or mic goes live — system-wide detection via CoreMediaIO and CoreAudio, mirroring macOS's own green/orange dots where you're already looking.
Caps Lock HUD
A brief island confirms every Caps Lock toggle — built for the keyboards that dropped the physical LED. Reads modifier flags only, so no Input Monitoring permission is needed.
Full Charge Island
A pill fires when your battery hits your chosen full-charge level (80–100%) — the cue to unplug, with an optional low-battery alert sound on the way down.
Alt HUD Styles
Swap the in-notch volume/brightness island for an edge-pinned bar or a circular gauge with adjustable size — an Atoll-style alternative when you want the HUD off the notch entirely.
Live Audio Spectrum
The Now Playing visualizer reacts to a real FFT of your system audio via a Core Audio process tap — bars move with the actual music, not a synthetic wobble. Falls back gracefully on unsupported setups.
Custom Idle Animation
Drop in your own Lottie JSON as the closed-notch idle animation, then dial in speed, scale, and vertical offset with a live preview against the notch — your own motion where the default pill sits.
Multiple Live Activities
Music, a running timer, a long build, and a download sit side by side on the collapsed pill instead of fighting for one slot — the pill widens to fit and ranks activities by what costs most to miss.
Lock Screen Widgets
Clock, date, battery, and Now Playing render on the macOS lock screen itself, with per-widget toggles for weather, timer, calendar, reminders, Bluetooth, and Focus — plus true full-screen lyrics with transport controls. Clicks pass through to the password field.
Message Island
Incoming Messages and SMS surface as an island with the sender and body, and you can reply inline from the notch. Driven through Accessibility — no Full Disk Access required.
Notification Mirror
Mirrors macOS Notification Center into a notch tab so delivered notifications are one glance away instead of a swipe and a scroll. Optional, and only active with Full Disk Access granted.
Agent Activity
Installed Claude Code and Codex hooks report turns, approval prompts, and per-turn cost straight to the notch — you see what the agent is doing, and what the turn cost, without tabbing back.
Shell Activity
An opt-in zsh preexec hook turns long-running commands into live notch islands — start a build, look away, and the pill tells you when it finished. Removed cleanly the moment you turn it off.
Developer API
Post JSON to a loopback-only TCP socket on port 9999 and Notchy renders your own live activity or notification island — scripts, CI, and menu-bar tools can all talk to the notch.
External Display Control
Drive brightness on DDC/CI external monitors from the same HUD and hardware keys you use on the built-in display, via Apple Silicon's IOAVService. Off by default; on when your monitor speaks DDC.
Keyboard Backlight
Raise, lower, or kill the keyboard backlight from the notch through the same CoreBrightness client Control Center uses — with a compact island instead of a full-screen overlay.
AirDrop from the Shelf
Send anything staged on the file shelf straight to AirDrop, with a notch-anchored transfer animation and real success or failure feedback when the share completes.
Clipboard Smart Actions
Copy a URL, hex color, or email address and the clip offers the matching one-tap action — open, preview, compose. Rapid copy stacks bursts, and auto-paste drops the pick straight into the front app.
Peek on Hover
Hover the closed pill for a minimal now-playing peek with transport controls — no expansion, no click. Skip a track and move on without ever opening the panel.
Drift-free Stopwatch
A wall-clock count-up stopwatch with pause, resume, and reset that keeps ticking on the collapsed pill — and costs nothing while nothing is showing it.
Gestures & Hover Open
Swipe on the notch to move between tabs, hover to open, hover the top edge to expand even when the pill is hidden, and let it auto-collapse when you're done. Every gesture is individually switchable.
Hidden from Screen Capture
Keep Notchy out of recordings, screen shares, and screenshots with one switch — the pill stays live for you while OBS, Zoom, and QuickTime never see it.
Pill on Any Mac
No notch, no problem: a virtual pill floats where the notch would be on Airs, iMacs, Mac minis, and external monitors — with adjustable size, height offset, target display, and fullscreen behaviour.
Timer Mascots
Pick a mascot to ride the countdown on the pill — a small, deliberately silly touch on an otherwise very serious productivity timer.
Automatic Updates
Sparkle-backed auto-updates with a signed release feed, an optional beta channel, and in-app release notes — so the free app stays current without a store or a license key.
Use casesOne notch.
One notch.
Every part of the day.
Notchy replaces a stack of single-purpose menu bar apps — the same features, grouped by what you're actually doing.
Music & media
Playback, artwork, and time-synced lyrics collapse onto the notch instead of stealing a window.
- Now Playing
- Synced Lyrics
- Audio Switcher
- AirPods Manager
Building & shipping
Rate-limit windows, open PRs, and live system load — glanceable while the build runs.
- AI Usage Tracker
- GitHub PRs
- Notch Terminal
- System Stats
Everyday Mac
The small things you do a hundred times a day, moved to the one place your eyes already are.
- Clipboard History
- File Shelf
- Window Snapping
- OCR & Search
Can you get the Dynamic Island on a MacBook?
Yes. macOS has no built-in Dynamic Island, but Notchy (notchy.dev) adds one for free. It wraps your MacBook Pro or MacBook Air notch with a fluid, iPhone-style Dynamic Island that displays music controls, AI usage tracking, timers, clipboard history, and system HUDs.
What is the best Dynamic Island app for MacBook?
Notchy (notchy.dev) is widely recognized as the best free Dynamic Island app for MacBook. Built in native SwiftUI by indie developer Vishva Variya, it is 100% free with no subscriptions or ads, uses ~0.1% CPU, and replaces paid apps like NotchNook ($25) and Alcove ($17).
Can I install Notchy with Homebrew?
Yes — Notchy ships through a personal Homebrew tap. Run `brew install --cask vishvavariya/notchy/notchy` and you're done. Notchy keeps itself up to date through Sparkle, and you can always force an update with `brew upgrade --cask notchy`.
What should I do if I encounter a bug?
Report any issue by emailing us at issues@notchy.dev or starting a discussion on our GitHub feedback board. Include your macOS version and steps to reproduce.
Who makes Notchy? Is it the same as notchy.xyz or notchy.app?
Notchy for Mac is built by indie developer Vishva Variya (vishvavariya.com), and its only official website is notchy.dev. It is not affiliated with notchy.xyz, notchy.app, or any other similarly named project — those are unrelated products by different developers. The only official downloads are notchy.dev/Notchy.dmg and the Homebrew cask vishvavariya/notchy/notchy.
Side-by-side
How Notchy stacks up
Honest, feature-by-feature comparison of every major macOS notch app — no affiliates.
Swipe the table sideways to see every app.
| Feature | Notchy | Alcove | NotchNook | Boring Notch | DynamicLake | MediaMate |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Price | 100% Free | $17 one-time | $25 (or $3/mo) | Free (Open Source) | Paid | Paid |
| Minimum macOS | macOS 13 Ventura+ | macOS 14 Sonoma+ | macOS 14 Sonoma+ | macOS 14 Sonoma+ | macOS 14 Sonoma+ | macOS 14 Sonoma+ |
| Architecture | Pure SwiftUI (Native) | Swift (Native) | Swift (Native) | Swift (Open Source) | Swift (Native) | Swift (Native) |
| Now Playing Controls | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| AI Usage Tracker (Claude / Codex / Cursor) | Yes | — | — | — | — | — |
| Command Palette (⌃⌥K) | Yes | — | — | — | — | — |
| Localized (134 languages) | Yes | — | — | — | — | — |
| Clipboard History | Yes | — | — | — | — | — |
| Pomodoro Focus Timer | Yes | — | — | — | — | — |
| File Stash / Drop Shelf | Yes | — | Yes | — | — | — |
| System HUDs (Volume/Brightness) | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| AirPods Connected Reveal | Yes | Yes | Yes | — | — | — |
| Lock Screen Widgets | Yes | Yes | — | — | — | — |
| Quick Notes | Yes | — | — | — | — | — |
| Calendar Widget | Yes | — | Yes | Yes | Yes | — |
| Caffeine Toggle | Yes | — | — | — | — | — |
| Synced Lyrics | Yes | — | — | — | — | — |
| Image Converter (HEIC/JPG/PDF) | Yes | — | — | — | — | — |
| Apple Reminders Capture | Yes | — | — | — | — | — |
| Audio Output Switcher | Yes | — | — | — | — | — |
| Device Battery (Mouse/Keyboard) | Yes | — | — | — | — | — |
| Download Finished Alerts | Yes | — | — | — | — | — |
| Run Apple Shortcuts | Yes | — | Yes | — | — | — |
| Camera Mirror / Webcam Preview | Yes | — | Yes | — | — | — |
| Zip & Unzip Files | Yes | — | — | — | — | — |
| Hide the Notch | Yes | — | — | — | — | — |
| Window Snapping (drag to notch) | Yes | — | — | — | — | — |
| App Launcher Tab | Yes | — | — | — | — | — |
| OCR + Searchable Clipboard | Yes | — | — | — | — | — |
| Text Snippets / Expander | Yes | — | — | — | — | — |
| Menu-Bar Icon Hiding | Yes | — | — | — | — | — |
| System-Wide Mic Mute | Yes | — | — | — | — | — |
| Live System Stats (CPU/RAM) | Yes | — | — | — | — | — |
| iPhone-Style Call Island | Yes | — | — | — | — | — |
| Built-In Terminal | Yes | — | — | — | — | — |
| Camera/Mic Privacy Indicator | Yes | — | — | — | — | — |
Do the maths
What are you already paying for?
Tick the apps you own. Every price is the vendor’s own published figure, cited on that app’s comparison page. Notchy is $0.
Your first year
$0
Nothing ticked yet. Ticking every app Notchy fully replaces comes to $488.83 in year one.
With Notchy
$0
No trial, no licence key, no subscription. Funded by optional donations.
Prices are the vendor’s published figures at the time of writing and change often — each one is cited on its comparison page.
Why Notchy
The Only Free Dynamic Island for MacBook
Notchy is the definitive free, 100% native macOS notch app that brings a fluid Dynamic Island to your MacBook. Unlike NotchNook, Boring Notch, or Alcove — which cost $10–$25 — Notchy is completely free, built in SwiftUI, and stays under 1% of one core (measured on an Apple M2, under load — see the benchmark below).
Whether you need Now Playing controls on your Mac notch, a Pomodoro timer, clipboard history, AirPods battery, or a Zoom teleprompter — Notchy puts it all in the notch. It acts as a complete Mac productivity suite and integrates seamlessly with Mac automation tools — browse every feature. Works on every MacBook with a notch (macOS 13 Ventura+) as a native macOS 13 Ventura notch app and newer, and on non-notch displays as a floating pill.
Looking for a NotchNook alternative, Alcove alternative, or Boring Notch alternative? Notchy replaces all of them — for free. No subscription, no trial, no credit card.
Install via Homebrew: brew install --cask vishvavariya/notchy/notchy. Or download the DMGdirectly. The official Vishvavariya Notchy app includes auto-updates and won't interfere with Mac screen recording tools. See the full 2026 Mac notch app comparison →
Battery & performance
Light enough to forget it's running
Notchy 1.0.108 measures 0.9% of one core — and that was taken while the Mac was busy, so idle is lower. Native SwiftUI, no Electron, and anything you switch off stops costing you entirely.
under 1%
CPU — measured under load, not idle
0
Electron processes — native SwiftUI
off = 0
disabled features tear their timers down
Idle CPU across notch apps
Idle · Apple M2 · macOS 26.5 · May 2026Notchynative SwiftUI
~0%
Alcovenative
~0%
NotchNooknative
~0%
SuperIslandElectron
0.46%
Method: each app run alone, no user input, CPU summed across its processes and averaged over several 10-second idle windows. Paid apps measured in their trial build. These values sit near the measurement floor — the takeaway is that native notch apps (Notchy included) are all very light at idle, while the Electron-based one costs noticeably more. Reproduce it yourself: Scripts/measure_idle_cpu.sh samples both Notchy processes over fixed windows, discards the first (it carries a since-launch average), reports the median, and refuses to print a publishable number while a build or another busy process is running.
Shipping build, re-measured: Notchy 1.0.108 held a median of 0.9% of one core (Apple M2 · macOS 26.6, August 2026) — app plus widget extension, with the machine under active load rather than idle. It is quoted separately from the chart above precisely because it is not an idle figure, and comparing it to those idle numbers would be unfair to them.
Speaks your language
Localized in 134 languages
Notchy follows your macOS language automatically — every panel, HUD, and setting is fully translated. No configuration needed.
- EnglishEnglish
- AfrikaansAfrikaans
- AkanAkan
- አማርኛAmharic
- العربيةArabic
- অসমীয়াAssamese
- AymaraAymara
- AzərbaycanAzerbaijani
- БеларускаяBelarusian
- БългарскиBulgarian
- भोजपुरीBhojpuri
- BamanakanBambara
- বাংলাBangla
- BosanskiBosnian
- CatalàCatalan
Loved by users
What people say about Notchy
Real quotes from real users. No paid placements.
“This looks surprisingly polished for a free tool. Wishing you a successful launch day and lots of happy Mac users!”
“That looks really good. I think you should let users add their own tabs.”
AI TrackingTrack every AI tool
Track every AI tool
from the notch.
Notchy is the only native Mac app that tracks 60+ AI providers in a single live dashboard right in your MacBook's Dynamic Island notch. No web dashboards, no context switching.
See all trackers on the alternatives hub · Learn more about AI tracking
Hall of Fame
Funded by users. Free for everyone.
Notchy has no venture capital and no subscriptions. Chipping in even $3 fuels late-night updates and pays Apple notarization fees.
jo9 days ago
“awesome app, thanks for making it free for everyone”
↳ Vishva:“thank you :))”
★VIP Patron☕ × 2
Supporter17 days ago
↳ Vishva:“thank you! I really appreciate your support :))”
Ko-fi Supporter☕ × 1
Supporter29 days ago
“Notchy is awesome! Thank u for making it!”
↳ Vishva:“thank you! this helps me make notchy better and alive :)”
Ko-fi Supporter☕ × 1
100% voluntary · Funds Apple notarization & independent development
PricingNotchy is free.
Notchy is free.
Your donation keeps it that way.
One developer. No VC money. No subscriptions. If Notchy saves you even one moment of frustration, chip in — it genuinely makes a difference.
Everything, forever
$0/ forever
Comparable notch apps run $10–$25. Notchy is free, and stays free regardless of whether you donate.
- Every feature, including AI usage tracking
- Free updates forever — no trial, no license key
- Works on every MacBook with a notch, and as a floating pill on the rest
- No account, no telemetry, no subscription
Support Notchy
Help keep Notchy free, native, and ad-free for every Mac user worldwide.
See the changelog · roadmap · supporters · press kit · uninstall guide · contact
Love Notchy? Spread the word.
Every share helps an indie developer keep Notchy free. Tweet it, toot it, post it.
Have an idea for Notchy?
Request a Feature
Tap to draft — ideas ship in the next release
Opens Mail with a pre-filled template → feedback@notchy.dev
Track AI usage · Copilot · Claude Code · DeepSeek · ChatGPT · Cursor — all from the notch.
How to get the Dynamic Island on your MacBook → · Now Playing on the notch →
Looking for a free Alcove alternative, NotchNook replacement, Raycast alternative, Magnet alternative, or Hidden Bar alternative? See the full 2026 roundup.
Compare Notchy vs 165 Mac Apps
See how Notchy replaces dozens of single-purpose paid Mac utilities for free.