A menu-bar guard for macOS
Arm your Mac.
It locks the moment anyone touches it.
MacLock sits quietly in your menu bar. Press ⌘⌥L to arm it — then the next mouse movement, click, or keypress locks the screen instantly. Walk away from an agent at work, and the machine guards itself.
Free · Apple notarized · No account · No tracking · macOS 13+
Agent running · screen unlocked
Touch the trackpad and it locks.
Why it exists
Built for the Mac you can’t lock yet.
An agent is editing files, a build is running, a long task is mid-flight. Locking the screen the normal way would freeze the work — so you leave it open and hope nobody wanders by.
MacLock fixes that. Arm it and walk away: your task keeps running untouched, but the instant a real person moves the mouse or hits a key, the screen locks. You return, unlock, and pick up where the agent left off.
- Agents and scripts keep working while armed
- Physical input — not software — triggers the lock
- 2-second grace so arming doesn’t trip it
- Locks and disarms in one motion — just unlock to resume
- 🔒IdlePress ⌘⌥L to arm
- 🔓Arming2-second grace period
- 👁ArmedWatching for any input
How it works
Three small steps.
One shortcut, total peace of mind.
- 01
Set your shortcut
Pick any combination with a modifier — the default is ⌘⌥L. It registers globally, so it works from any app.
- 02
Press to arm, then step away
A 2-second grace lets you take your hand off the trackpad. Then MacLock records a baseline and starts watching.
- 03
Any input locks it
Mouse movement past the drift tolerance — or any click or keypress — locks the screen instantly and disarms. Unlock to resume.
Privacy
A guard that watches your Mac, not you.
MacLock only cares about one thing: whether a person is touching the machine right now. It does not log what you do, where the cursor goes, or what you type — it just locks and gets out of the way.
- ●
- MacLock runs entirely on your Mac. There is no server, no sync, and nothing leaves the machine.
- ●
- Nothing to sign up for. No analytics SDKs, no telemetry, no crash pipeline that ships your data away.
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- Distributed with an Apple Developer ID, Hardened Runtime, and Apple notarization — so it opens cleanly with no Gatekeeper warning.
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- Mouse and click detection need nothing special. Keyboard detection is an optional Input Monitoring layer you can skip.
Everything stays local
No account, no tracking
Signed and notarized
Minimal permissions
FAQ
Questions, answered plainly.
What does MacLock do?
It lives in your menu bar. Press your shortcut to arm it — after a short grace period it watches for human input. The moment the mouse moves past a small drift tolerance, or any click or keypress arrives, it locks your screen and disarms. You come back, unlock, and carry on.
Why not just lock the screen directly?
Sometimes you can't. If an AI agent or a long script is driving your Mac, locking it outright would interrupt the work. MacLock lets the agent keep running while still protecting the machine — it only locks if a real person touches the trackpad or keyboard.
How do I change the shortcut?
Click the menu-bar icon and choose “Change Shortcut…”, then press any combination with at least one modifier (⌘ ⌥ ⌃ ⇧). The default is ⌘⌥L. Your choice is remembered across restarts.
What is the drift tolerance?
A small movement allowance — 3% of your screen's diagonal — so sensor jitter or a tiny bump doesn't trip it. A deliberate nudge of the mouse still locks instantly. You can tune it in the source if you want it tighter.
Does it need any permissions?
Mouse-movement and click detection work with no special permission — MacLock simply samples the cursor position. The optional keyboard-detection layer asks for Input Monitoring the first time, but the app is fully functional without granting it.
Is it signed and safe to install?
Yes. MacLock is signed with an Apple Developer ID, built with the Hardened Runtime, and notarized by Apple — so it opens with a normal double-click, no Gatekeeper warning.
Does it collect any data?
No. There is no account, no analytics, no telemetry, and no server. Everything happens locally on your Mac.
What macOS versions are supported?
macOS 13 (Ventura) or later, on both Apple Silicon and Intel.
Leave your Mac armed.
Walk away without worrying.
Install MacLock from a single notarized download. It is free, opens with a double-click, and takes under a minute to set up.