Caffeinated 3.2.0 for macOS

The built-in timer with optional notifications is what sold me. I don't always need my Mac wide awake all afternoon—just for the next forty minutes while a render finishes.

One click in the menu bar stops sleep

Click the little coffee cup in your menu bar. That's it. The icon fills up, and your Mac stays awake, the display stays bright, and the screensaver won't kick in.

Keeps your screen awake unplugged

Yes. A MacBook doesn't need to be plugged in for Caffeinated to do its job. It's handy when you're reading a long article away from your desk and tired of tapping the trackpad.

Can I set a timer instead of leaving it on forever?

You can. Pick a duration—say, two hours—and Caffeinated deactivates automatically when time's up. You'll get a notification if you want one.

What about Dark Mode?

It's optimized for Dark Mode and respects your system accent color, so the menu bar icon feels at home whether you run a light or dark setup.

Imagine a teacher running a slideshow for a ninety-minute lecture from a MacBook Air. She can't afford the display dimming while she's pointing at a graph, and she definitely doesn't want the machine nodding off between slides. A right-click on the coffee cup before class starts, and she's set. The caffeinated mac app keeps the screen alive without her touching the trackpad every few minutes, and the timer she set for exactly ninety minutes means she doesn't have to remember to turn it off when the students pack up.

Right-click toggles it on or off

• By default, left-click opens the menu and right-click toggles activation. That's the opposite of what a lot of menu bar utilities do, so it trips people up at first.
• The app has no Dock icon—it lives entirely in the menu bar, which keeps things tidy.
• If you're using the timer with notifications turned on, the notification appears even when Do Not Disturb is active, so you won't miss it.
• The icon respects system accent colors, so if you've set your Mac to a gold or graphite highlight, the tiny cup follows along.

Closing the lid without putting the machine to sleep used to be a separate tweak. Now it's just a setting. Version 3.2.0 adds an option to keep the system awake even when the lid is shut.

• macOS 15 or later
• Works on both Apple Silicon and Intel Macs