MacMonitor
GitHub
MacMonitor System monitor for macOS

A lightweight menu bar app for real-time CPU, memory, and process monitoring on macOS. Pure Python — no Electron, no Dock icon, no bloat.

Get started View source
5srefresh
6metrics
0Electron
Menu bar preview See how the icon looks on a dark menu bar
Live preview
File Edit
Tue 14:32 C:20% M:70%
OK · HEALTHY
CPU [■■□□□□□□□□] 20.8% OK
GPU · IDLE
RAM [■■■■■■■□□□] 70.3% of 8.0 GB
Wired: 1.44 GB
Active: 2.32 GB
Compressed: 1.30 GB
Cached: 2.31 GB
SWAP [■■□□□□□□□□] 17.5%
Settings
Thresholds · CPU 85% · MEM 80% · SWAP 20%
Processes
CPU
Safari5.1%
WindowServer4.2%
ControlCenter3.8%
Memory
Safari2.1%
Finder1.4%
ghostty1.1%
Refresh
View Logs
Copy Stats
v1.0.0 · live preview
Quit

Interactive preview — matches the real menu bar app

Why MacMonitor

Built for macOS, not ported to it

Native

Uses vm_stat, sysctl, and UserNotifications — the same primitives macOS itself relies on.

Lightweight

Menu bar only. No Dock icon, no Electron shell, near-zero idle overhead with a 5-second poll interval.

Actionable

Full memory breakdown, lag-risk detection, top processes, and kill-from-menu — not just percentages.

Features

Everything in one menu bar click

The dropdown mirrors the real app — stats, thresholds, processes, and alerts.

Menu bar

Bar-chart icon plus live C:XX% M:XX% stats. A colored dot appears for warn, high, or stress — no noisy text prefixes.

  • Template icon adapts to light/dark menu bar
  • Updates every 5 seconds
  • Click to expand full breakdown

Memory

Full macOS memory decomposition — not just a single percentage.

  • Wired, Active, Compressed, Cached
  • Lag risk when Compressed > Active
  • Swap usage with progress bar

Processes

Top CPU and memory consumers, refreshed live.

  • Top 5 per category
  • Kill via SIGTERM from menu
  • GPU-heavy apps auto-tagged

Alerts

Native UserNotifications with smart cooldown.

  • CPU, memory, swap thresholds
  • Memory pressure & lag risk
  • 120s cooldown per metric

Compare

How it stacks up

MacMonitor fills the gap between Activity Monitor and heavyweight third-party suites.

MacMonitorActivity MonitoriStat Menus
Menu bar live stats✓—✓
Memory breakdown✓partial✓
Process kill from menu✓——
Open source✓——
No subscription✓✓—
Python / hackable✓——
Electron-free✓✓✓

Install

Up and running in a minute

Requires macOS 12 Monterey or later and Python 3.9+. No build step, no Xcode project.

macOS 12+ Python 3.9+ MIT

Auto-start on login via LaunchAgent — see the docs. Logs at ~/Library/Logs/MacMonitor/macmonitor.log.

Terminal
$git clone https://github.com/dinexh/Monarx.git MacMonitor
$cd MacMonitor
$python3 -m venv .venv && source .venv/bin/activate
$pip install -r requirements.txt
$python main.py