Work in intervals. Take the breaks.

Focus Cadence is an interval timer for macOS. A session is a run of focus blocks with breaks between them, so it opens and closes on focus: finishing the last block is the end of the stretch. Set your own pattern, or plan a whole day around fixed times, and let a single field of color tell you which phase you are in. It lives in the menu bar with a live countdown, and it can pause itself when you lock the screen or walk away.

It also has a nudge. Sit still long enough and your chat app decides you have left, whatever you are actually doing. Once you have gone still, the nudge asks you to touch the keyboard or mouse, so your status stays green while you are still at your desk. The ask is quiet by default, a flash of the window and a word in the menu bar, with a sound or the full-screen moment if you want them. It only ever asks. It never moves anything on your behalf.

It stores nothing outside your Mac and has no server of its own. What you do with your time is your business.

Descended from the Pomodoro Technique, though the shape is its own.

Get it

Get Focus Cadence on the Mac App Store. Download is free, and most of what the app does is yours to adjust: how long work and breaks run, where the long breaks fall, which of the four alerts announce a phase change, from a sound to the full-screen moment, a wash of color across the whole screen for a couple of seconds with nothing to click away, how long you can be idle before it pauses for you, and which of the built-in themes colors the window.

A single one-time purchase unlocks three more. The nudge keeps your status green while you are still at your desk. Planned days build a schedule around a fixed start and finish and a lunch that will not move, with the work blocks made out of whatever time is left between them. Custom colors let you start from any built-in theme and make it your own.

Support

Questions or trouble? Write to support@focuscadence.work. See the support page for the short answers first.