If you’ve been looking for a Rainmeter-style desktop customization tool for Mac, you’ve probably landed on GeekTool. It’s been the go-to answer for years: overlay live system stats, weather, clocks, and scripts directly on your desktop. The problem? GeekTool hasn’t been updated since around 2013, and macOS has moved on considerably.
The honest answer in 2026: GeekTool still works, but only with some workarounds, and only if you’re not on Apple Silicon. If you’re on a newer Mac, Übersicht is almost certainly what you actually want. This guide covers both. It explains how to get GeekTool running if your setup supports it, and when to cut your losses and switch.
What GeekTool Actually Does
GeekTool lets you place “geeklets”, live widgets, directly on your macOS desktop. There are four types: Shell (runs a terminal command and displays the output), Image (displays a local or remote image), Web (renders a URL or HTML), and Log (tails a log file in real time).
Shell geeklets are where most of the power is. You can display the current date, CPU usage, uptime, now-playing info, weather, or anything a terminal command can output. The output sits directly on your wallpaper, updating at whatever interval you set.
Before You Start: Know the Compatibility Situation
GeekTool 3.3.1 is the current and final version. It’s a 64-bit Intel app that hasn’t been updated since around 2013 and is no longer maintained or notarized. It can technically launch on Apple Silicon under Rosetta 2 and on Catalina and later, but expect instability, rendering glitches, and no support if something breaks.
- Apple Silicon Mac (M1, M2, M3, M4): GeekTool isn’t optimized for Apple Silicon and is unreliable even under Rosetta 2. Use Übersicht instead, skip to that section below.
- Intel Mac on macOS Sonoma or Sequoia: Expect crashes, flickering, and broken rendering. Proceed with caution.
- Intel Mac on macOS Monterey or Ventura: Partially functional with Accessibility permissions granted. Some geeklets work, some don’t.
- Intel Mac on macOS Big Sur or older: Best-case scenario for GeekTool. Still not great, but functional.
If you’re not sure which chip your Mac has, go to Apple menu > About This Mac. If it says “Apple M” anything, GeekTool isn’t for you.
How to Install GeekTool
The official Tynsoe Projects site is no longer active. Download GeekTool 3.3.1 from a trusted mirror. MacUpdate hosts a copy, as do several GitHub mirrors. Don’t download from random sites; stick to sources with version history and user reviews.
- Download the GeekTool 3.3.1
.dmgand open it. - Drag GeekTool to your Applications folder.
- Right-click the app and choose Open, don’t double-click. Gatekeeper will block it otherwise since it’s not notarized.
- When macOS asks if you’re sure, confirm you want to open it.
- Open System Settings > Privacy & Security > Accessibility and toggle GeekTool on.
Without Accessibility access, geeklets won’t render on the desktop. This is the most common reason GeekTool appears to do nothing after launch.
Setting Up Your First Geeklet
Once GeekTool is running, you’ll see its main panel, a row of geeklet type icons you can drag onto your desktop.
Drag the Shell icon onto your desktop. An empty, invisible widget appears where you dropped it, and a Properties panel opens on the right.
A few things worth knowing about the Properties panel:
- Position your geeklets by dragging them on the desktop, don’t try to calculate pixel coordinates manually.
- Set Refresh to how often the command should re-run. For something like a clock, 1 second makes sense. For CPU usage, 5 seconds is fine. Don’t set everything to 1 second or you’ll notice the performance hit.
- Click Click here to set font & color to control how the output looks, font, size, color, and alignment are all adjustable.
To add a command, click the three dots next to the Command field. This opens the Edit Script window. Paste your command, close the window, and save when prompted.
Shell Commands That Actually Work in 2026
Several classic GeekTool scripts are broken. The Yahoo Weather API died in 2019. Gmail integration via older scripts is gone. Here’s what still works reliably:
Date and time:
date "+%A, %B %d"date +"%l:%M %p"Uptime:
uptime | awk '{print "Uptime: " $3 " " $4 " " $5}' | sed -e 's/.$//g'CPU usage (vertical breakdown):
echo "CPU usage"
top -l 1 | awk '/CPU usage/ {print $8, $9}'
top -l 1 | awk '/CPU usage/ {print $10, $11}'
top -l 1 | awk '/CPU usage/ {print $12, $13}'Display any static text:
echo "your text here"Weather (OpenWeatherMap replacement): The old Yahoo-based weather scripts are dead. You’ll need a Python script using the OpenWeatherMap API with your own API key. The community GitHub repos (search “geektool weather openweathermap”) have working examples. It’s more setup than it used to be.
For a broader collection of scripts, the geeklets GitHub repo is the most maintained archive. Just note that many scripts target older OS X versions and may need path adjustments.
Troubleshooting GeekTool
Geeklets aren’t showing up on the desktop. Check System Settings > Privacy & Security > Accessibility and make sure GeekTool is enabled. If it’s already listed but not working, remove it and re-add it. You can also reset permissions from Terminal with tccutil reset Accessibility, then relaunch GeekTool.
The app won’t open at all. You’re likely on Apple Silicon or macOS Sequoia. GeekTool is unstable in both environments and often fails to launch or render correctly. Move to Übersicht.
Geeklets flicker or disappear. Known issue on macOS Sonoma and Sequoia due to Metal rendering changes. No reliable fix exists. This is a sign the tool has hit its limit on your system.
Scripts that used to work are broken. Check whether the command relies on an external API (weather, stocks, email), as those are almost certainly dead. For system commands, verify the path hasn’t changed by running the command in Terminal first.
Leftover geeklets after uninstalling. Delete ~/Library/Preferences/com.trixx.GeekTool.plist and check Activity Monitor for any GeekTool processes still running.
The Better Option: Übersicht
If GeekTool isn’t working on your Mac, or you just want something that’s actually maintained, Übersicht is the answer. It does everything GeekTool does, runs natively on Apple Silicon, works on macOS Sequoia, and has an active community building widgets for it.
Widgets in Übersicht are written in JavaScript (using CoffeeScript or JSX), which is more approachable than raw shell scripting for most people. There are 100+ community widgets available, including working weather widgets via the Open-Meteo API (no API key needed).
Install it via Homebrew:
brew install --cask ubersichtOr download directly from the Übersicht website. Once installed, drop widget files into the Übersicht widgets folder and they appear on your desktop immediately. No restart required.
If you’re on a modern Mac and were planning to spend an afternoon getting GeekTool working, spend it on Übersicht instead. You’ll get further, faster.
Other Alternatives Worth Knowing
macOS Widgets + Scriptable: macOS Sequoia’s native widgets can be pinned to the desktop via Stage Manager or by right-clicking the desktop and choosing Edit Widgets. The Scriptable app lets you write JavaScript to build custom widgets that pull live data, with no third-party overlay engine needed.
Rainmeter via UTM: If you specifically want Rainmeter skins, running Windows in a VM via UTM (free) is surprisingly viable on M-series Macs. Not a lightweight solution, but it gives you the full Rainmeter ecosystem.
Is GeekTool Still Worth It in 2026?
If you have an older Intel Mac that you’re keeping around specifically for this kind of customization, GeekTool can still do the job, with caveats. The core Shell geeklets work, the date/time and system stat commands are solid, and the community scripts on GitHub fill in most gaps.
But if you’re on Apple Silicon, or if you’re running macOS Sonoma or Sequoia, GeekTool is no longer a practical option. It’s not getting updates, it’s not getting notarized, and the rendering issues on modern macOS aren’t going away.
Übersicht solves the same problem GeekTool used to solve, works on every current Mac, and has an active community behind it. That’s where the desktop customization scene has landed, and it’s a genuinely good tool, not just a consolation prize.