42 Great Freeware Apps for Mac
March 17, 2009 at 08:03:23 AM, by Tryggve
Apple is not known for peddling cheap hardware, but once you have emptied your savings account to get that gorgeous little apparatus it’s not necessary to waste additional cash on software.
There are free alternatives to most commercial software if you know where to look. This is by no means a complete list of all the great Mac freeware out there, but I think it’s a decent start. Feel free to add your own favorites in the comments. Some of these apps are "donationware," meaning if you like it you are encouraged to donate an optional amount to the creator(s).
Office and Productivity
Open Office (Aqua) – Previous versions of Open Office relied on X11 and was a bit awkward and clunky, but Open Office Aqua (based on OO 3.0) is very fast and the look and feel is more ‘Mac-like’ than previous versions.
NeoOffice – Based on Open Office and a long-time favorite to many Mac users. NeoOffice is stable, fast and more “aquafied”. Both NeoOffice and Open Office are clearly competent and full-featured alternatives to MS Office or iWork.
GIMP – GIMP (GNU Image Manipulator?) is probably better known as the first choice for Linux users as it’s included in nearly all Linux distributions. It is however also available for both Mac and Windows. The Mac version uses X11 and might not be as good looking or as Photoshop but it gets the job done for free. Also check out our tutorial on how to make GIMP behave like Photoshop.
Inkscape – Another entry from the open source community: Inkscape is a powerful vector graphics editor. It is commonly available via Linux package managers, but also free for Windows and Mac users (via X11).
Seashore – is based on GIMP but does not rely on X11 to run. It’s fast, easy to use and Cocoa integrated, which makes up for it not having all of the features from GIMP yet.
Anxiety – A very simple and efficient To-do-list app that synchronizes with Mail and iCal in Leopard.
Google SketchUp – An easy way to create and edit 3D models, and it’s integrated with Google Earth. It’s not 3ds max, but still powerful and completely free. You can play with existing models from Google’s 3D Warehouse, use it when building a new house or anything in between.
Jumpcut - provides a clipboard history, i.e., anything that you have previously cut or copied remains in Jumpcut’s “buffer” for convenient access.
MenuCalendarClock – If you want a full calendar to appear when you click on the clock in the menu bar, MenuCalendarClock will provide it. It’s configurable and integrated with iCal. A commercial version with more features is also available.
Entertainment
VLC – VideoLAN VLC is one of the best and most popular media players ever; it’s available for Mac, Linux and Windows and is free. You don’t have to bother with different media codecs like Xvid or FLAC, since VLC already has built-in support for all of them.
MPlayer OS X – MPlayer is yet another Linux freebie that has been reworked for OS X. It’s a highly competent media player that will play almost anything you drag and drop in its interface.
Songbird – An open source iTunes replacement, customizable with add-ons. Songbird supports formats that iTunes does not and offers support for web media such as Last.fm.
Geeky
Xbench – If your turn-on’s include comparing and measuring MFLOPs and MIPS, Xbench is a perfect partner. Of course, if you have from the aforementioned fetish you most likely know about it already. Xbench hasn’t been updated for a while, but it still does its job and is frequently used in reviews of new Macs.
iStat Menus – If you want more information about your system than the mundane and ordinary Activity Monitor will provide and want it constantly accessible, iStat Menus is a great alternative. It’s installed as a preference pane and resides in the menu bar, where it can be customized to display all kinds of system information including CPU, memory and hard drive usage, temperatures, processes and more.
iStat Pro – If you need a complement or alternative to iStat Menus you can also install iStat Pro from iSlayer.com, which measures and probes more or less the same things as iStat menus but in the convenient form of a dashboard widget.
Deeper – Deeper is a great free app that lets you access and tinker with lots of hidden configuration options in Tiger and Leopard.Tools and Utilities
Unrarx – A lightweight and free archive expander that handles the most common compression, namely RAR.
LockTight – Some Windows users are accustomed to using a simple keyboard shortcut to lock and password protect the computer. With LockTight you get the same useful functionality for your Mac.
VirtualBox – If you occasionally need to run Windows (or Linux) on your Mac, you are probably familiar with either Parallels or VMware Fusion. VirtualBox is a free Open Source virtualizer available for all operating systems including OS X. It doesn’t work with your bootcamp partition out of the box, but it offers good performance (relative to the competition) and has a “Unity” mode to run Windows programs in the dock.
AppleJack – OS X usually runs smoothly, but if you run into trouble AppleJack might be able to fix it. AppleJack is a troubleshooting tool that can repair disks, repair permissions, clean up cache files and validate preference files.
BootChamp – a very simple utility that resides in the menu bar and lets you switch to your bootcamp Windows partition very quickly and easily.Camouflage – The easy way to clean up your cluttered desktop by simply hiding the icons when they’re not in use.
DeepSleep – A dashboard widget that enables hibernation on newer Macs. Normally you can put the computer to sleep, but not fully suspend by saving RAM to disk. This issue is taken care of by DeepSleep.
MainMenu – Not as much a Main Menu as a Maintenance Menu; this is a useful and slightly geeky tool that lets you perform a variety of system maintenance tasks from a single drop-down menu. Some highlights include clearing system or browser cache, enable/disable dashboard and repair disk permissions.
AppCleaner – There are several “app removal” applications like AppCleaner available for OS X, but unlike AppCleaner most of them are not free.Carbon Copy Cloner – Offers a different kind of backup functionality than Apple’s Time Machine that may be highly useful in certain scenarios. With Carbon Copy Backup you can create identical, bootable backups and backup to disk images.
ClamXav – Viruses and malware aimed at OS X are a rare breed, but there are a few threats and you may want to use an antivirus program as a preventative measure. It may also help avoid spreading Windows viruses via email attachments etc. ClamXav is a free variant.
Burn – The name says it all; Burn puts anything you want it to on a CD or DVD. It supports audio, video and data CDs and DVDs, and also has some DVD menu editing capabilities.
MultiClutch – MultiClutch is an awesome and highly useful utility for your new MacBook. It brings multi-touch gestures to all applications instead of just the Apple ones, and even adds some new functionality. It can be configured to work globally (with all apps) or assign different gestures to individual apps.
Orbiter – An easy to use launcher for apps, documents and folders that you want quickly accessible. Orbiter can be set to vanish when it’s not in use and complements your dock in a practical way.
Internet
Vuze – The Java-based BitTorrent client Azureus has been rebranded and is now called Vuze; it offers a lot of functionality and can be configured extensively.
Transmission – A very simple and easy to use torrent app with a minimalist interface. Compared to Vuze it uses much less resources, but it still offers all the features you need from a BitTorrent application, such as bad peer blocking and watch directories.
PeerGuardian – If you use P2P file sharing apps, PeerGuardian is an essential tool. It blocks millions of “bad” IP’s known to interfere with file sharing.
Camino – Made for Mac and based on FireFox, but is not as flexible as it lacks the same add-on support. Many users clearly prefer it over both FireFox and Safari though. Take your pick.
Firefox – Why so many Windows users stick with Internet Explorer 6 is a bigger mystery than why Mac users stick with Safari, but there’s a better alternative to both. Use MultiClutch if you want the multi-touch gestures from Safari working in Firefox
Skype – The world’s most popular VoIP client for free worldwide phone calls over the Internet, and also used for instant messaging.
Adium – If you use several instant messaging applications, Adium is a must-have. Adium connects seamlessly to all your IM accounts and puts them in a single, pleasant interface. It supports lots of IM clients including AIM, Bonjour, ICQ, MSN, Google Talk, Jabber, Yahoo Messenger, and numerous others.
NetNewsWire Lite - A very popular, useful and free (the Lite version) newsreader for Mac. Works with RSS and Atom feeds.
Vienna – A free open source RSS/Atom newsreader; Vienna has an easy to use interface with “smart folders” and folder groups where you can organize RSS subscriptions in categories. It also has a built-in web browser based on Safari.
Cyberduck – Cyberduck is a powerful FTP client with nice, clean looks and a long list of features. It communicates over FTP as well as secure SFTP.
Gmail Widget – This little dashboard widget lets you take a quick look at your Gmail email account.
Other
Google Earth – Hard to categorize, but udoubtedly worth mentioning in any “great free software” list. If you’ve never actually tried Google Earth yet, it’s about time.
Page:1/1
Stay up-to-date with the latest mobile technology news and laptop reviews with our free newsletter! Get free tips, news and information from Laptop Logic and find the best laptop deals online.
Comments
jim at 00:20, July 30, 2010
Good post, very popular blog i guess. cheap iphone
Jack at 23:48, July 01, 2010
Thanks for sharing. i really appreciate it that you shared with us such a informative post.. thesis writing | buy research paper
Jack at 23:48, July 01, 2010
Thanks for sharing. i really appreciate it that you shared with us such a informative post.. thesis writing | buy research paper
JANIERamos at 20:51, June 04, 2010
I think that to receive the loan from creditors you must have a firm motivation. However, one time I have received a short term loan, just because I wanted to buy a car.
GenevaMitchell at 02:33, May 06, 2010
Don't you recognize that this is the best time to get the lowest-rate-loans.com, which will help you.
ClaraKennedy at 09:14, May 01, 2010
Some time ago, I needed to buy a good car for my organization but I did not earn enough cash and could not purchase something. Thank goodness my fellow suggested to try to take the http://www.lowest-rate-loans.com at reliable bank. Therefore, I acted so and used to be happy with my short term loan.
JacobsCindy31 at 11:57, April 16, 2010
I think that to receive the business loans from banks you ought to have a good reason. However, once I've got a auto loan, because I wanted to buy a building.
AVISPratt29 at 16:01, March 28, 2010
It is good that people are able to receive the personal loans moreover, it opens up completely new chances.
RoweGeorgette at 05:30, March 22, 2010
I strictly recommend not to hold off until you get big sum of money to buy goods! You can take the loan or financial loan and feel free
LatonyaVang22 at 03:40, March 15, 2010
A lot of specialists say that business loans aid people to live the way they want, just because they can feel free to buy necessary stuff. Moreover, a lot of banks present sba loan for all people.
PooleMelba26 at 05:15, March 13, 2010
I would like to propose not to wait until you earn enough money to buy different goods! You should just take the loans or just consolidation loans and feel free
Trujillo34Hannah at 18:10, March 12, 2010
All people deserve wealthy life time and loan or just sba loan can make it better. Because people's freedom is based on money state.
Ellen21Zz at 13:46, January 25, 2010
In my opinion, writing services compose the superior news or english dissertation just like this post, hence, different students can have buy dissertation and, maybe, that is contingent to receive the online thesis writing or written essay.
ihatebush at 16:36, May 06, 2009
There's another good Mac freeware list at http://macfreewarereviews.com
J0hnathan at 03:08, April 01, 2009
Mac The Ripper? DVD Ripper for Mac
Dotan Cohen at 04:56, March 25, 2009
Where are the chrome-pin icons from? I'd really like to install that icon set in Ubuntu.
Robert Garrigos at 08:47, March 18, 2009
EvnetBox is a great tool that saved me from getting lost in my social accounts (Facebook, Flickr, Twitter) and RSS feeds by keeping them all in one application: http://thecosmicmachine.com/