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App$$$Cheap: Roughly under $50, or under $15/month.Stairways Software

Keyboard Maestro

macOS macro tool that fires multi-step actions from a hotkey or typed string

Triggers are the starting point: a hotkey, a typed abbreviation, an app switch, a time of day, a device you plug in. Keyboard Maestro fires a multi-step macro from any of them. You build each one from a large palette of actions. One trigger can move windows, paste boilerplate, drive a menu item, click a position on screen or chain a dozen steps together. The app reaches parts of macOS that Shortcuts cannot. Long-time Mac users keep it installed for that, and most end up with dozens of small macros rather than a few large ones.

Who backs it

Sorted by strength of stance

  • David SparksDoes it

    Apple productivity writer · MacSparky

    He had planned to swap his full-size Apple keyboard for one without a number pad. Those keys turned out to be too useful in Keyboard Maestro, so the big keyboard stayed, and he says the extra stretch across to the trackpad no longer bothers him.

    Source: MacSparky: Studio

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App entry · notes paraphrased from cited sources, quoted excerpts copied from the transcript they link to. Not medical advice. Not affiliated with, endorsed by, or reviewed by anyone listed. How this works.