3 Nice Mac Apps
It seems that making a good Mac app is a bit of a lost art (even Apple seem to be struggling). Given that, I’d like to highlight some of the apps that actually get it right. These are all proper, native apps— not Chromium instances in a trench coat.
I have no financial association with any of these apps— no sponsorships, no affiliate links. Just some genuine recommendations for apps that I find useful.
Deliveries ($4.99 / year)
Deliveries has everything I’ve wanted out of a package tracking app. It’s polished, supports push notifications nicely, syncs between devices reliably, and (crucially) it’s managed to track every package I’ve thrown at it. And while I generally don’t like app subscriptions, Deliveries’ low fee is easy enough to swallow.
The design of the app is generally great. My only complaint is the design of the sidebar, which can make it difficult to tell which package is currently selected. Consider it a small road bump in what’s otherwise been a fantastic app.
Also available on: iOS/iPad OS/WatchOS
Boop (Free & Open Source)
Boop is the developer utility I never knew I wanted. It’s a plain text scratchpad with a collection of handy functions at arm’s reach. Beautifying JSON, decoding a JWT, escaping slashes— Boop just handles it. It’s stupid simple, yet incredibly useful.
Seriously, just go try it— you’ll “get it” once you’ve used it.
Things 3 ($49.99, Free Trial)
I wish every app on my Mac felt as good as Things. Its interface is stylish, both at rest and in motion. Each small detail and animation feels crafted with experience and care. Yet the app is technically excellent, with commendable speed and reliability. It is an impressive feat for an app with so many non-system controls to feel this great on the Mac.
Things is the to‑do app for people who like to organize. You can group your to‑do items into projects, which can even have their own internal sub-headings. Each to‑do and project has the essential “assigned date” and “due date” fields, plus a handy tagging system. With this much depth, Things feels less like a to‑do app and more like a one-person project management tool.
It’s certainly on the pricier side, but there’s no recurring subscription fee and the app has continued to receive updates at no extra cost. A release this year even added Markdown support to the “notes” field on to‑do items and projects.
All that said, there are some features which are unfortunately absent, and Things will leave you crawling back to the stock Reminders app— namely, location-based reminders and shared lists.
Also available on: iOS/WatchOS, iPadOS