Menubar Countdown is a simple countdown timer displayed in the macOS menu bar. It can be used as a pomodoro timer, to remind yourself to get back to work after a break, or whenever you want to quickly set a time limit on some activity.
To set the timer, click the menu bar icon and select the Start... menu item. A dialog will appear allowing you to specify the countdown time in hours, minutes, and seconds. The dialog also allows you to specify which of the following forms of notification you want when the timer gets down to 00:00:00:
- Blink the icon in the menu bar.
- Play the system alert sound.
- Display an alert window.
- Display a notification in Notification Center.
- Make a spoken announcement. You can specify the text to be spoken.
The countdown timer can be controlled using AppleScript, JavaScript, or Swift. See the examples in the Scripts directory for details.
Releases are available from:
- The Mac App Store
- https://github.com/kristopherjohnson/MenubarCountdown/releases
- Homebrew (e.g.
brew install --cask menubar-countdown)
The current 2.1 version of Menubar Countdown requires macOS Mojave 10.14.4 or newer. It is compatible with macOS Catalina 10.15.
For macOS versions 10.6 through 10.14.3, use version 1.3.
For macOS 10.5, use version 1.2, available from http://s3.amazonaws.com/capablehands/downloads/MenubarCountdown-1.2.zip
To build in XCode
- Product > Clean Build Folder
- Change "Team" under "Signing & Capabilities"
Copyright 2009,2015,2019,2020 Kristopher Johnson
Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a copy of this software and associated documentation files (the "Software"), to deal in the Software without restriction, including without limitation the rights to use, copy, modify, merge, publish, distribute, sublicense, and/or sell copies of the Software, and to permit persons to whom the Software is furnished to do so, subject to the following conditions:
The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included in all copies or substantial portions of the Software.
THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE AUTHORS OR COPYRIGHT HOLDERS BE LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OR OTHER LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE, ARISING FROM, OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR OTHER DEALINGS IN THE SOFTWARE.
v2.2 (in progress)
- Support Command+drag icon from menu bar to terminate
- Add tolerance to once-per-second timer to improve energy usage
v2.1 (2019/11/10)
- Add scriptable interface for AppleScript and OSA languages.
- Add service-provider interface for control via the Services menu in other applications.
- High-resolution menubar icon for Retina displays.
v2.0 (2019/10/28)
- Updated for macOS 10.14.4 and newer.
- Distributed through the Mac App Store.
- Supports dark mode.
- When timer is not active, menubar displays small hourglass icon rather than 00:00:00, to conserve menubar space.
- Added option to repeat alert sound after timer expiration, until it is acknowledged.
- Added option to blink 00:00:00 in the menu bar after timer expiration, until it is acknowledged.
- Added option to show a notification alert in Notification Center.
- Added Pause and Resume menu items.
- Translated code to Swift.
v1.3 (2019/10/21)
- Works on macOS 10.15 Catalina.
- Minimum macOS version supported is now 10.6. (10.5 is no longer supported).
- 32-bit processors are no longer supported.
- Growl is no longer supported.
v1.2 (2009/06/22)
- New application icon
- Command-X, Command-C, Command-V, and Command-A now work in the text fields in the settings dialog
- Command-R is now a shortcut key for the Restart Countdown... button in the alert window
- Add option to hide seconds in menu bar
- Show start-timer dialog when application launches
- Add Growl notifications. The Announcement text specified in the Start dialog will be displayed in the Growl notification window.
v1.1 (2009/04/20)
- timer-expired alert window floats above other applications' windows
- added application icon
- added Doxygen comments to source code
v1.0 (2009/04/09)
- initial release