Compare · checked September 2026
Boring Notch vs notchos
Boring Notch is the free, open-source option — music controls, a shelf, a calendar, and the good sense to stop there. It is the right answer if “free and open source” is the requirement itself, and it covers most people’s media-control needs at no cost at all.
Boring Notch’s own site — see it for yourself before deciding anything.
Where Boring Notch wins
- Free, GPL-licensed, and auditable — you can read every line it runs.
- Covers the media-control and shelf basics well.
- A community that keeps it moving.
Where notchos differs
- notchos adds the working layer: live revenue and analytics, timers, stats, weather, clipboard history, files conversion, markets, feeds, habits, health.
- On-device dictation with deterministic cleanup and 60+ spoken commands.
- Twenty-seven integrations against read-only keys; capture hiding from screenshots and screen sharing; window snap.
- A dollar short of ten, once — for people who want the paid version of this idea to do everything.
The honest verdict
If free is the point, Boring Notch is a good citizen of your menu bar. If the notch is where you want your tools — not just your transport controls — that is the gap notchos is built to fill.
Twenty tools. One hover. $9.99, once.