WindowShade
Roll it up. Keep its place.
Double-click a title bar and the window rolls up into a thin bar, right where it was.
Double-click again and it’s back. Rest the pointer on the bar to glance at it without unrolling.
A free, open-source window utility for Mac.
Current release: 1.0.21 · build 20261110.01 · 2026-11-10 · Release notes
Download for Mac · Website · Intro video (Bilibili, in Chinese) · Window stories · 简体中文 · 繁體中文
The interactive illustration from the website: Reference rolls up, and the draft behind it shows through. Try it yourself →
Three ways to move a window aside. Only one never makes you look for it.
When a window covers something, you probably close it or minimize it. Both work. Getting it back just takes a little effort.
| Where the window goes | Getting it back |
|---|
| Close | It’s gone | Open it again, then find your place again |
| Minimize | Into the Dock | Spot it in the Dock first |
| Roll up | A thin bar, right where it was | Double-click the bar |
Unlike minimizing, the window never leaves the desktop. Drag the bar somewhere else and the window opens there.
Download
Get the latest DMG from Releases, open it, drag WindowShade.app onto Applications, then open it and follow the permission prompts. (The ZIP is the same app and is what in-app updates use.) It lives in the menu bar and stays out of your Dock.
- Needs macOS 15 or later. Apple Silicon is the main build.
- Intel Macs (experimental, from 1.0.21). Releases also has a separate ZIP whose name ends in
-intel.zip. It has not been tried on a real Intel Mac, only in a Rosetta smoke test, so expect rough edges. Face unlock, voiceprint and the lid-close desktop effect are off and hidden on Intel; pinned previews, Picture in Picture and everything else work the same. The Intel build updates from its own feed, so it is never offered the Apple Silicon ZIP, and Apple Silicon Macs are never offered the Intel one. If something goes wrong, please open an issue.
- 1.0.21 download (decimal MB): 22.49 MB ZIP, or a 23.54 MB DMG for a first install. The experimental Intel ZIP is 11.24 MB.
- Notarized by Apple. macOS checks it on first launch, so there’s nothing to override.
- Updating from 1.0.16 or earlier: download this one by hand, then reopen Accessibility (and Screen Recording, if you had turned it on) in System Settings → Privacy & Security. From here on, updates install from the menu.
- With Homebrew:
brew install --cask surfine/tap/windowshade.
- Every release ships with a SHA-256 checksum file; for what changed in each version, see the release notes.
What it does
Roll up. Double-click a title bar or press ⌃⌘C and the window rolls up into a thin bar; double-click the bar to unroll it. The bar can keep the window’s own look, or use one consistent title bar. While a bar is in front, ⌘W, ⌘M, ⌘H, ⌘Q and ⌘N go to the window and app behind it; ⌘Q puts the window back down first, so any “save changes?” question is where you can see it.
Title-bar gestures. Put the pointer on a title bar and swipe with two fingers: push up to roll up, pull down to fill the screen between the menu bar and the Dock, push up again to put it back. Nothing happens until you let go, so pulling back halfway undoes it, and a panel styled like the system volume indicator says what letting go will do. Swipe sideways for half the screen; keep swiping the same way for two thirds, then one third, and once more moves the window to the display on that side. Turn down or up after a sideways swipe to take that corner. Spreading two fingers also fills the screen, and pinching undoes the last placement. Drag a title bar, throw it and let go, and the window glides the way you threw it — up rolls up, down fills, the sides walk the same steps, and a throw aimed at a corner takes it. With an ordinary mouse, three notches of the wheel on a title bar count as one swipe; Magic Mouse support is still being checked on real hardware. Details are in the gesture notes.
Glance. Rest the pointer on the bar and a card drops down beneath it, showing the window's content at its own size; move away and it rolls back up. Click the card to unroll the window for real; on a Force Touch trackpad, pressing firmly on the bar also glances, and letting go puts it away. The bar stays put and the card hangs just below it, so it reads as a preview, not the window itself. A glance never switches the app you’re in and never moves a window. A window that was minimized when it rolled up can’t be shown live, so you see how it looked then, and the corner says so. Details are in the glance notes.
This is the beginning of the README. Read the rest at the original. Read the full README ↗
