2020 has finally come to an end and let’s be honest, no one would predict this bumpy ride a year ago. But life goes on anyway. We are starting to see yearly wrap-ups everywhere just as usual. Joining the conversation, we have concluded the best Mac apps of 2020. As long as you are still using a Mac, these are some things that can improve, no matter what happens.
Cleaner One Pro
Apple has announced the new M1 MacBook this fall. For most users, it is quite improbable to always have the newest Mac. Good thing is, with Cleaner One Pro, you can let your current Mac run as smoothly as possible. It is an all-in-one optimization tool that can clear up storage space, delete junk files, duplicate files and similar photos. You can also give your mac a quick cleanup or monitor CPU and Network usage with the menu bar icon, which is always a plus.
Download here
Bear
Still using Word or Pages for all the writing tasks? You need to try Bear, a writing and note-taking app that uses Markdown as its markup language. With a minimalist interface, Bear creates an immersive writing environment that can help you focus on the content. You can still use the basic writing features such as italics, heading and underlining with keyboard shortcuts. Comparing to other apps in this category, Bear has a relatively affordable price and the premium version will only cost you $14.99/year. It also has a free version that covers the basic functions.
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Amphetamine
Have you ever tried to download or upload a large file but kept getting disrupted because your Mac automatically went to sleep? Amphetamine is a simple, yet powerful app that offers the solution by keeping your Mac awake all the time. With its help, you can even keep downloading documents even when the display closed. Most importantly, the developers made a promise that Amphetamine will always be free and ad-free.
Download here
Fantastical
Fantastical is one of the most well-received calendar apps. Recently, it released the 3.0 version, which now allows you to invite other users when creating a new event. It also includes the function “interesting calendar” that shows all kinds of festivals, sports and other activities.
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Slack
Slack is the messaging app you need for teleworking. You can organize group conversations by topics or projects, share and edit work-in-progress documents with other team members, integrate with other tools such as Google Drive, Dropbox and Salesforce. With slack, communication comes with collaboration naturally.
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Focus to-do
Pomodoro gained its popularity for a reason—it works. By dividing your time into different sessions, usually 25 minutes for focused working and 5 minutes for relaxing, you will find that your productivity increases significantly. Focus to-do is a Pomodoro timer that helps count that sessions. You can customize the length of sessions and adjust it according to your habit. The timer will appear on menu bar so you can keep an eye on it. The app also offers a to-do list feature, with which you can plan ahead the sessions needed for a certain task.
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Affinity Photo
You know how good this app is when people keeps comparing it with Adobe Photoshop. Affinity Photo covers most of Photoshop’s functions and is perfect for both professional and personal use. It also has a cleaner interface and is smaller in size compared to other apps. Most importantly, you don’t have to subscribe to use it; a one-time purchase with $49.99 and it’s yours, completely.
Download here
Antivirus One
It is possible for macOS to be infected by viruses or other attacks. You also need to pay close attention to cybersecurity. Antivirus One is an app that can help make your Mac safe. It will scan and detect potential threats, including viruses and junk ads from the Internet. There is also a real-time monitor that will keep your computer under protection all the time.
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IINA
A good video player on Mac is underrated. Although most of the times VLC and QuickTime Player work just fine, sometimes they just cannot open certain files or have hard times adjusting subtitles. IINA is rated by many users as the best Mac video player, and it deserves this praise. It works smoothly as a player and can even play online videos with the URL feature. For foreign films without subtitles, it can help you find subtitle files online. You can crop the video, adjust its ratio and speed.
Download here
Notion
Notion is not your average note-taking app. It is more like a tool that helps you build a database with a clear structure. By linking different pages together and creating sub-pages, you can use Notion to do basically anything, from organizing class notes to planning your everyday schedule.
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Alfred
If you like using Spotlight search, you will love Alfred. It is an application launcher and productivity tool that features hotkeys, keywords and text expansion. With Alfred, you do not have to open a web browser, type the whole link to open the website. The process is all simplified; you only need to type in a few keywords in the Alfred searchbar. By customizing the keywords and preferences, you will have a much more efficient workflow.
Download here
LiquidText
Famous among iPad users, LiquidText is a great PDF viewer on Mac. It has the basic viewing and highlighting features, as well as an additional “ink link” function that lets you link texts from different pages, or even different files together.
Download here
Paprika
Quarantine has made people become great cooks. In times like this, Paprika comes in handy. It is a recipe manager app that not only organizes your recipes, but also generates a smart grocery list, which helps you create monthly or weekly meal plans. It also has cool features, such as a timer and a scale conversion calculator, within the app. With Paprika, home cooking can be a whole new experience.
Download here
AdBlock One
Annoyed by ads that keep popping up when you just want to concentrate on the contents? AdBlock One is a useful tool that can give you a clean browsing environment. You can choose to hide or unhide certain elements on a webpage and block pop-ups. If you want to unblock the pop-ups and ads for some specific websites, you can simply create an exception list. AdBlock One can also prevents scams from gathering your data.
Download here
Deliveries
Packages always come with holiday seasons. Since online shopping has become the norm this year, you probably need this package management app more than ever. Deliveries is an app that can track all your packages so you do not have to open several different apps or emails separately to check when will the packages arrive. It counts the days until scheduled deliveries and archives all packages that have been delivered for your future reference.
Download here
