TopShelfYour Mac has a new favourite spot.
Music, files, meetings, timers and healthy breaks, beautifully tucked into the top of your Mac. There the moment you reach for it, invisible when you don't.
Free for 14 days, then $9.99 once · macOS 14 Sonoma or later · 7.3 MB
Try it right here, in five moves
0 of 5- 1Open TopShelfHover or tap the black bar
- 2Put a file on the ShelfDrag a file up to the bar
- 3Play a songMusic tab, then play
- 4Start a focus timerTimer tab, then start
- 5Take a 20-second breakBreaks tab, then Break now
The idea
That little space up top? It's yours now.
TopShelf turns the most overlooked part of your screen into the most useful.
Product tour
One day with TopShelf. Just keep scrolling.
Always there
It waits quietly up top.
TopShelf lives in a slim black bar at the top of your screen. Move the pointer up and it opens; move away and it tucks itself back in.
Feature playground · 14 modules
Everything you need. Right where you need it.
Now Playing
Your soundtrack, always within reach.
Apple Music and Spotify, with an optional real spectrum visualiser. Skip, pause or scrub without leaving the window you're working in.
Break reminders
Work in a healthy rhythm. Rest on time.
By default, 20 minutes of work, then a 20-second break, and a 5-minute long break every third time. All adjustable, and only active time counts.
- 1
A gentle heads-up
A minute before a break, TopShelf asks: start now, delay 1, 5 or 15 minutes, or skip.
- 2
“Break in 7…”
For the last 10 seconds, a small countdown follows your pointer, with optional soft ticks.
- 3
A beautiful pause
A full-screen break on every display: drifting gradients with film grain, your blurred desktop or your own image, an eye exercise or stretch and water illustrations, a big countdown and today's stats. Then focus goes back to your app.
Smart Pause
Waits while you type or drag, and holds during calls, video, full-screen apps and focus apps you choose. Stepping away counts as a break.
Your schedule
Office hours, planned breaks like lunch or a walk, Shortcut and AppleScript automations, and an optional display sleep on long breaks.
Casual, Balanced or Hardcore
Choose how easy skipping is. Postpone, “I'm rested”, and an emergency press-and-hold exit for when you really need it.
Menu bar & shortcuts
Status and controls in the menu bar, with an optional minutes-left label, plus global shortcuts.
Daily stats and a Screen Score
Screen time, breaks taken and skipped, your longest and typical session, top apps, and a 0–100 Screen Score with a 7-day view. Stats stay on your Mac.
- Screen time
- 3 h 41 min
- Breaks
- 6 taken · 1 skipped
- Longest session
- 52 min
- Typical session
- 21 min
- Top apps
- Xcode · Safari · Mail
Example day.
New in 1.1 · Preview available
Alerts worth celebrating.
All of this is in the TopShelf 1.1 preview, ready to download at the bottom of the page.
Celebration alerts New in 1.1
Time's up? Make it an entrance.
When an alarm, timer, meeting, reminder, goal or new message arrives, TopShelf plays a short broadcast-style stinger. The pill drops below the camera into a wide banner, a colour panel wipes across, the icon drives in, a bold headline slams down with a few sparkles and a scoreboard chip rolls in its value. Then it folds back into the pill with the details. All in 1.9 seconds.
Alarms punch the headline twice. Routine events like a file added, something copied, a new track or a device connecting stay quiet. Choose Celebration, Colour flash or None in Settings › Appearance › Alert animation. Reduce Motion turns it into a short fade.
Every headline · tap one to play it
The chip only ever shows a value the alert itself contains. No value, no chip. Colour flash, the 1.0 style, floods the bar with the alert's colour and fades back to black instead.
Opens on your Shelf
TopShelf now opens on the File Shelf (pick another view in Settings › General). Only blinking new mail or messages open their own view first. Hold ⌘ while you drag a file anywhere and it flies onto the shelf, no aiming needed. Folders and apps drag back out too.
Stays open while you use it
If you've clicked, scrolled or dragged in TopShelf and the pointer slips out, it waits a moment (3 seconds by default, adjustable from 0 to 10) with a thin line draining along the bottom. Come back and it stays.
Install & start at login
Opened from a download or the disk image, TopShelf offers to move itself into Applications. It starts at login by default; turn that off in Settings › General or System Settings › Login Items, and it stays off.
Clipboard, upgraded
Favourites, rich text, verification codes that delete themselves after two minutes, keyboard and drag-out, and AI actions on text. Still opt-in and local-only.
Also in the 1.1 preview
- BreaksHeads-up, floating countdown, full-screen pause on every display, Smart Pause, office hours, Casual/Balanced/Hardcore, daily stats and a Screen Score.
- Seven finishesClassic Black, Glass, Chrome, Aurora, Midnight, Neon and Luxe Gold.
- Pin what you usePinned module tabs in the header; everything else in the All grid.
- Wellness remindersNine reminders with intervals, active hours and a water log.
- Calculator with a tapeRolling digits, a live result and a history tape.
- Inbox and Live Scores (opt-in)Mail unread counts per account and the WhatsApp badge; scores for the competitions you follow.
Built for Mac
Feels like it was always part of your Mac.
On MacBooks with a camera housing, TopShelf lines up with it exactly and folds back into it.
- 01100% Swift, SwiftUI & AppKitNative to the Mac, with zero third-party dependencies.
- 02Lines up with the cameraSits exactly around the camera housing on MacBooks.
- 03Works on every MacDraws its own bar on an iMac, Mac mini or external display.
- 04Never steals focusHover to expand after 0.18 s; the app you're in stays active.
- 05Springs, not slidesPhysical motion that respects Reduce Motion.
- 06Hides in full screenFull-screen apps get the whole display.
- 07A 3.8 MB downloadA universal binary for Apple silicon and Intel.
- 08macOS 14 Sonoma or laterLiquid Glass on macOS 26 and later.
Details
The little things make it lovely.
Drag, drop, done.
Fling a file at the top of the screen and it lands in the Shelf, ready for wherever you need it next.
Music in a glance.
The track and a tiny visualiser sit at the top of your screen while you work.
A nudge before meetings.
A quiet heads-up, minutes before you're due.
Transitions that make sense.
Every module grows out of the top of your screen and returns to it, on springs that respect Reduce Motion.
Light or dark, your call.
Switch appearances and TopShelf follows along.
Keys for everything.
Open TopShelf, your clipboard history or a new note without touching the trackpad. These are the defaults; change any of them in Settings.
- ⌃⌥V Clipboard history
- ⌃⌥T New quick note
- ⌃⌥D Dashboard
Make it yours
Seven finishes. Tuned to the pixel.
The same ranges and defaults as TopShelf's settings. A preview on this page only.
Private by design
No accounts. No tracking.
TopShelf is native Swift with no third-party code, and almost everything it does happens on your Mac.
- No accounts, no trackingNo accounts, analytics, telemetry or crash reporting. Permissions are asked for only when you turn on a feature that needs them.
- Only three kinds of network requestAlbum artwork, Assistant requests you start (including clipboard AI actions you pick), and live scores if you turn them on, for only the competitions you follow.
- Off until you chooseInbox, Live Scores, Clipboard and Assistant stay off until you turn them on. Break reminders and watched folders are off until you set them up.
- Stays on your MacClipboard history, shelf files, notes, break stats and wellness history stay on the Mac. API keys live in the macOS Keychain.
- Reads only what's neededFrom Mail, only unread counts are read, never messages, senders or subjects. TopShelf never opens Mail; it checks about once a minute while Mail is running. Calendar is read-only.
Pricing
Try it free. Keep it for $9.99.
One price, paid once. No subscription, no account and nothing to cancel.
Day 1 of your free trial
drag me →Every feature on your own Mac, from the first minute. No card, no sign-up.
- Music, Shelf, Calendar, Timers and Breaks
- All 14 modules and Celebration alerts
- Every theme, accent and size setting
Pay once and keep TopShelf on your Macs.
- Everything in the trial, to keep
- Use on 2 Macs
- Updates: every 1.x update, free
Prices in US dollars. One licence covers 2 Macs.
FAQs
Questions, answered.
TopShelf is a Mac app that turns the dark strip around your MacBook's camera into a calm, glanceable home for music, files, meetings, timers and more, and reminds you to take healthy breaks. Move your pointer to the top of the screen to open it; move away and it tucks itself back.
Free for 14 days · then $9.99, once
Give the top of your screen something to do.
Drag TopShelf onto Applications, or tap it, to download.
macOS 14 Sonoma or later · Apple silicon & Intel · 7.3 MB disk image
Includes Celebration alerts and everything new in 1.1. Prefer the earlier release? Download 1.0.0 (2.9 MB)
- 14modules in one quiet bar
- 19celebration headlines
- 3.8 MBuniversal download
- 0accounts to create
Made for the little space that does a lot.