A Mouseposé Alternative for demos
Mouseposé is the presenter's classic from Boinx in Munich: it dims the screen and shines a spotlight around the pointer, draws circles on every click (a different colour for right clicks), can show your keystrokes and play click sounds, and runs back to macOS 10.14. It's paid, with a free trial. Notchy 1.0.180 adds the same core kit to the app you already have in the notch.
Looking for Mouseposé itself? It lives at boinx.com/mousepose.
- Mouseposé price
- Paid, free trial
- Mouseposé requires
- macOS 10.14 Mojave or later
- Notchy price
- $24.99 one-time, 7-day free trial
Why use Notchy instead of Mouseposé?
- Hold ⌃⌥ for a spotlight
Hold Control and Option and everything dims except a soft circle around the pointer; let go and it's gone. A short hold delay means ordinary ⌃⌥ shortcuts never flash it.
- Click ripples and a halo
A ring spreads from every click — a double ring for right clicks — and an optional halo follows the pointer and squeezes when you press.
- A pointer your audience can find
Recolour the system pointer itself (Neon, Amber, Frost and more) and scale it up to 2×. Apple's shapes and hotspots are kept, so nothing clicks in the wrong place.
- Where Mouseposé is better
It has click sounds and adjustable dimming, puts keystrokes on screen beside the pointer, and has more than a decade of presenter use behind it. Notchy's keystroke HUD shows shortcuts in the notch instead.
Everything Notchy does, in one app
- Fluid Dynamic Island animations on the Mac notch
- Command palette (⌃⌥K) — every action one keystroke away
- Knock — double-tap a modifier key to open the notch
- AI usage tracker (Claude Code, Codex, Cursor, Copilot)
- Detach any tab into a menu-bar popover
- Now Playing music controls (Apple Music & Spotify)
- Time-synced karaoke lyrics under the notch
- Mac clipboard history shelf (password-manager safe)
- Searchable clipboard — filter by text, file name, or OCR'd words
- On-device OCR — copy a screenshot, get its text (Apple Vision)
- Window snapping — drag a window to the notch to tile it
- App Launcher — pin apps to the notch, open with one tap
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- Text snippets — TextExpander-style pastes from the ⌘K palette
- One-tap screen capture to clipboard + shelf
- Color eyedropper — sample any pixel, hex auto-copied
- System-wide mic mute for every meeting app at once
- Keystroke HUD for demos & screencasts (secure-input safe)
- Keyboard cleaning lock with countdown island (⌘⎋ unlocks)
- Menu-bar icon hiding — Bartender-style separator & chevron
- Live CPU / memory / network stats flyout
- Custom islands through the local developer API (off by default)
- iPhone-style call island — Answer/Decline FaceTime on the notch
- Notch Terminal — real VT100/xterm shell in a PTY, its own tab
- Camera Guard — alert (or block) when any app opens your camera
- Caps Lock HUD — brief island on every toggle
- Full Charge island with adjustable threshold + low-battery sound
- Alt HUD styles — edge-pinned bar or circular gauge off the notch
- Audio-reactive Now Playing visualizer (real FFT of system audio)
- Custom closed-notch idle animation — drop in your own Lottie JSON
- Drag-and-drop file drop shelf — persists across relaunches
- Zip & unzip files right from the shelf
- Image converter (HEIC, PNG, JPEG, TIFF, PDF) + video → GIF
- Run Apple Shortcuts with one tap
- Screenshots auto-staged on the shelf, ready to drag
- Download finished alerts with Reveal in Finder
- USB drive mount island with one-tap Eject
- Apple Reminders quick capture & due list
- macOS Pomodoro notch timer & stopwatch — streaks + 7-day chart
- Resizable expanded panel (width & height, live preview)
- System HUDs (volume, brightness, battery)
- Audio output switcher (speakers, AirPods, monitor)
- AirPods connection manager & battery
- Magic Mouse, Keyboard & Trackpad battery + low-battery alerts
- Quick notes & Calendar widgets
- Camera Mirror (check your appearance)
- Keep Awake (caffeine toggle)
- Teleprompter (Cuely) for Zoom calls
- Focus-aware alerts & native haptic feedback
- Lock screen widgets & hide-the-notch mode
- 134 languages, fully localized
- Native SwiftUI, tuned for Apple silicon
The honest verdict on Mouseposé
Mouseposé is the proven presenter tool, with sounds and dimming control. If you want the spotlight and click rings without buying another single-purpose app, Notchy has them alongside everything else in the notch.
Mouseposé alternative — FAQ
Is Mouseposé free?
No. Boinx offers a free trial, then it's a paid app. Notchy's pointer effects are part of the app: one $24.99 licence after a 7-day free trial.
Does Notchy have a spotlight like Mouseposé?
Yes, from 1.0.180: switch on Spotlight in Settings → Pointer, then hold ⌃⌥. It needs Accessibility permission to see the modifier keys.
Can Notchy show my keystrokes during a demo?
Yes — the keystroke HUD shows the shortcuts you press as keycaps in the notch. It sits at the top of the screen rather than next to the pointer.
Does Notchy play click sounds?
No. Its click feedback is visual only: ripples, a double ring for right clicks, and a halo that squeezes on press.
Will the effects show up in screen recordings?
Yes. The ripples, halo, trail and spotlight are drawn on screen, so QuickTime, Zoom and OBS capture them like anything else.