Introduction

Alternative Styles

Installation

Download the latest release
Alternatively, you can use homebrew: brew install --cask alt-tab

Features

Switch focus to any window
Minimize, close, fullscreen any window; Hide, quit any app
Customize AltTab appearance (pick one of 3 styles, then customize further)
Custom trigger shortcuts with almost any keys
Blacklist apps you don’t want to list or trigger AltTab from
Light and Dark Appearance
Drag-and-drop things on top of window thumbnails
Accessibility: VoiceOver, sticky keys, reduced transparency, etc

Compatibility

macOS version: from 10.12 to latest
Apple Silicon: yes, AltTab is universal

Localization

AltTab is available in many languages: Bahasa Indonesia, Català, Dansk, Deutsch, Eesti keel, English, Español, Français, Gaeilge, Galego, Hrvatski, Italiano, Kurdî, Limba română, Lëtzebuergesch, Magyar, Nederlands, Norsk Bokmål, Norsk Nynorsk, Oʻzbekcha, Polski, Português, Português (Brasil), Shqip, Slovenčina, Slovenščina, Suomi, Svenska, Tiếng Việt, Türkçe, Íslenska, Čeština, Ελληνικά, Български, Русский, Српски / Srpski, Українська, עִבְרִית, العربية, فارسی, हिन्दी, বাংলা, தமிழ், ಕನ್ನಡ, മലയാളം, ภาษาไทย, 日本語, 简体中文, 繁體中文, 한국어

Contribute your own language easily!

Privacy and respecting the user

AltTab doesn’t upload or download any data without the user explicitly asking for it (e.g. asking to update the app, sending a crash report, etc)
AltTab uses as few resources as possible: CPU, memory, disk, etc. The app footprint is small (e.g. small disk size, minimal CPU use in the background, etc)

Configuration

Change the shortcut keys, switch to a Windows theme and more, using the Preferences window:

CLI usage

You can run CLI commands directly on the executable inside the .app bundle (e.g. /Applications/AltTab.app/Contents/MacOS/AltTab)

AltTab --list will return the list of windows (ID and title) in JSON
AltTab --focus=window_id will focus the window with the specified window ID

For this to work, you need AltTab.app to be running, to keep track of the state of windows, and execute the commands

Alternatives

Before building my own app, I looked around at similar apps. However, none was completely satisfactory so I rolled my own. Also, the almost-good-enough apps are not open-source.

Alternative	Differences
HyperSwitch and HyperDock	$10. Closed-source. Thumbnails are too small. App icon is on top of the thumbnail
WindowSwitcher	$7. Closed-source. Thumbnails are small and blurry. App icon is on top of the thumbnail
Switch	Open Source. Thumbnails are small. Very little customization. Latest release is from 2016
Witch and Contexts	$10-15. Closed-source. Focus on text. No thumbnails
MissionControl Plus	$10. Closed-source. No chronology and order to windows. Hard to navigate windows with keyboard
Built-in MissionControl	No keyboard support
Built-in `⌘ command` + `⇥ tab`	Only shows apps, not windows (note: can press down to see window of selected app)
Built-in `⌘ command` + `	Cycles through tabs and windows, but only of the same app. Only cycling, no direct access

There are also related apps which don’t really overlap in functionality, but target similar needs: Swish, Hookshot, Magnet, Spectacle, Rectangle, yabai, LayAuto, OptimalLayout, BetterTouchTool, BetterSnapTool, Moom, uBar.

License

AltTab is under the GPL-3.0 license.