macOS Apps

A few random thoughts that haven’t been mentioned yet:

Tot is a menubar app for quickly storing and accessing notes, and there’s an iOS version it can sync with.

The Unarchiver is a handy tool that supports a lot more formats than the system does, including rar and 7zip files.

1Blocker is the Safari adblocker I use. Works well on Mac, but noteworthy is that the iOS version has a “firewall” that uses a local VPN profile (doesn’t actually connect to an outside service) to block trackers in Safari as well as native iOS apps.

If you work with text in almost any capacity, BBEdit is still essential 32 years later.

Acorn and Pixelmator Pro are both great image editing apps; Apple just acquired Pixelmator though, so it’s not clear what’s going to happen with it in the long term.

Transmit is a great file transfer app, Panic makes absolute top tier software.

Happy to have you in Mac land. For me:

• VLC video player is a must. Free, open source, and just an absolute powerhouse of an app.
• Parsec is another I generally install right off the bat. Lets you connect to a windows computer (or other host OS) over the network. Like a low latency Remote Desktop, but for gaming (so it’s faster)
• Visual studio code is also a first install kinda app. If you do any coding, it’s pretty capable and I like it. Personal taste factors in for sure though.
• Orion is my preferred browser, primarily for its iOS app that allows you to ad block on mobile. I use it on desktop too so I can share tabs across all my devices.

If you tell me what other things you intend to do with it, I have more suggestions. Don’t wanna go to deep into development type apps unless you care.

• IINA for video. It's a VLC alternative that's much cleaner and mac native
• Homebrew. It's a terminal package manager. Super useful.
• Magnet for window snapping. macOS has this built in now and there are open source alternatives, but I bought magnet for a few dollars when the alternatives didn't exist.

As a side note, the default z shell (zsh) should be good enough for you unless you have a specific reason you need bash instead.

One of the first tools people tend to install is either Alfred or Raycast. I never used Alfred for more than a nifty app launcher, so a few weeks ago I've decided to uninstall it and just use the integrated Spotlight feature (⌘ + SPACE).

Same with window arrangement tools like Rectangle, Magnet or Swish. There's no real need since macOS 15.1.

What you DO need is AppCleaner. Instead of just dragging an app to the Recycle Bin to uninstall it, drag it into AppCleaner and it will find all additional stuff that app created and allow you to remove that, too. Maybe also add UninstallPKG to remove remnants of apps that were installed using .pkg files.

What I also use on a daily basis are a few extensions for Safari: Wipr to block ads in Safari, Noir to not get blinded at night, and SponsorBlock to skip ads in YouTube videos.

If you often download videos and audio files, Downie is pretty good for that.

Media playback: IINA and/or VLC.

If you want to play around on the command line, I prefer iTerm2 over the built-in terminal app. Install Homebrew to get a nice easy way of adding even more command line tools.

If you often organise your files using Finder, Yoink is great as a temporary bucket. iPreview and Peek (maybe Syntax Highlight, too) are great for previewing various kinds of files (SPACE in Finder).

For my office needs, I'm using all the integrated apps, e.g. Pages, Numbers, Calendar, Contacts, Reminders, Notes, Mail, etc.

I think that's as generic as it gets. I have lots of other apps, but they are mostly for specific things... nothing I use on a general basis.