Comparison
Tiling window managers for macOS
Four of them are worth your time, all free, all MIT licensed. They differ more than the category suggests, and one of them asks you to weaken macOS's security to do its best work.
I wrote hyprmac, so treat this as interested rather than neutral. I have tried to be accurate about the others and to say plainly where they are the better choice.
The short version
| yabai | Amethyst | AeroSpace | hyprmac | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Needs SIP disabled | For part of it | No | No | No |
| How it arranges | BSP tree | Preset layouts you cycle | i3-style tree | Dwindle tree |
| Config | yabairc shell | GUI or YAML | TOML | hyprland.conf syntax |
| Workspaces | macOS Spaces | macOS Spaces | Its own virtual ones | Its own, five, in the menu bar |
| Mouse and trackpad | Drag to swap | Limited | Keyboard first | Drag to swap or split, gestures |
| Multi-monitor | Yes | Yes | Yes | Not yet |
| Window animation | With SIP partly off | No | No | No |
| Maturity | Years | Years | Established | 0.1 beta |
Which to pick
yabai, if you want maximum control and accept the trade
The most capable of the four. Its scripting addition injects into Dock.app to
reach the window server, which is what unlocks Space manipulation, transparency, shadows,
sticky windows and animation. That injection requires System Integrity Protection to be
partially disabled. Many people make that trade deliberately and are happy with it.
More on what that actually costs.
Amethyst, if you want mature and uncomplicated
Years of use behind it, no SIP changes, and fourteen-plus layouts you cycle through with a shortcut: Tall, Wide, Columns, Binary Space Partitioning and more. You pick an arrangement for the whole screen rather than placing each window. Configurable through a GUI or a YAML file. If you want tiling that has been battle-tested by a lot of people, start here.
AeroSpace, if you come from i3
A tree-based tiler modelled on i3, with its own virtual workspaces rather than macOS Spaces, because Spaces are slow to switch and awkward to script. Plain TOML config, dotfiles friendly, CLI first, proper multi-monitor support. It is deliberately keyboard centric and skips appearance features. If you live in the keyboard and run several displays, this is probably your answer.
hyprmac, if you come from Hyprland or want to use a mouse
A dwindle tree, gaps, and a config file in hyprland.conf syntax, so a Hyprland
setup reads the way you expect. The part that is genuinely different: it is built to be
driven with a mouse and trackpad, not only a keyboard. Drag a window onto another and they
swap; drop it on an edge and that window splits with yours taking the half. Three fingers
switch workspace, three fingers up or down opens an overview.
It is a 0.1 beta and single-display for now, which are real reasons to pick one of the others.
Common questions
What is a tiling window manager?
Software that arranges your windows for you so they never overlap. Open a window and it takes a share of the screen; close one and the rest expand to fill the space. You stop dragging edges and hunting for buried windows.
Does macOS have tiling built in?
Sonoma and later can snap a window to half or a quarter of the screen by dragging it to an edge, and Sequoia added keyboard shortcuts for it. That is window snapping, not tiling: nothing rearranges itself when you open or close something, and there is no layout that persists.
Do any of these require disabling System Integrity Protection?
Only yabai, and only for part of its feature set. Its scripting addition injects into Dock.app to reach the window server, which SIP is designed to prevent. Amethyst, AeroSpace and hyprmac all run within what macOS already permits.
Which should I pick?
If you want the most capability and will disable SIP for it, yabai. If you want mature, well-tested tiling with many preset layouts, Amethyst. If you are an i3 user who lives in the keyboard and wants strong multi-monitor support, AeroSpace. If you are coming from Hyprland, or you want tiling you can drive with a mouse and trackpad from the first minute, hyprmac.
Are they free?
All four are free and open source under the MIT licence.
1.8 MB · Apple Silicon · macOS 14+ · free and MIT licensed