Changelog

Gauge has new type throughout: headings in Space Grotesk, everything you read in IBM Plex Sans, and the numbers in IBM Plex Mono so readings stay lined up as they change. The Energy tab now lists the five apps using the most memory, each with a Quit button, and the background apps list updates the moment an app opens, quits or comes to the front. Long Codex sessions no longer push up Gauge's own memory use, because it now reads only the end of the session log, and your Mac's name is no longer sent when you activate your licence.

The battery card is easier to read at a glance. Each row's icon takes the colour of what it reports, so anything that needs attention stands out, and time left on battery shows red under half an hour, amber under ninety minutes and green beyond that. Low Power Mode shows a green leaf and switch while it is saving you power, and earlier warnings in the day's list keep their own colour, so a low battery and a full disk look different.

The side tab now tucks into a small handle you click to bring it back, so hovering the screen edge no longer opens it by accident. The handle fades after 10 seconds, which keeps it out of full-screen films and apps, and comes back when your pointer reaches that edge; you can set it to Subtle, Standard or Bold to suit your wallpaper. Closing and the automatic tuck work reliably, hover cards no longer lag or overlap the tab, and the floating gauges switch has moved to Settings so it can't be turned off by accident.

Gauge is lighter on your battery: it uses about a third less processor while your Mac charges, and the Battery tab refreshes only while the panel is open. The tucked side panel waits for your pointer to rest on the edge before it slides out, and Settings › General lets you set that delay from instant to 3 seconds. Header icons explain themselves on hover, the licence pill in Settings is green when Gauge is activated and red when it needs activating, the Studio Gauge name has a fresh look, and a rare crash at launch is fixed.

Every button and tab now lights up on hover and shows a hand cursor across the panel, Settings, the HUD and onboarding, so you can see what's clickable before you click. Charging costs far less processor: the charging check ran every 2.5 seconds and sat near 13%, and now it runs every 20 seconds. Settings opens in its own window, and a long transcript history can no longer slow the panel down.

A new Warnings tab lists today's warnings with their times, and each warning stays on screen long enough to read. Overloaded appears only when macOS is taking a real share of your processor, and explains why in plain words. The Energy tab lists apps that are open with no windows and menu bar apps, each with a Quit button. A new switch hides the AI number in the menu bar and lets the Gauge icon itself turn green, amber or red. Gauge keeps its dark Studio Grid look everywhere, menu bar colours match each screen, and licence protection is stronger.

See how long until your Mac is full, reaches your charge limit, or runs out of battery. The Battery tab now lists your Magic Mouse, Keyboard, Trackpad and headphones with a heads-up when one runs low, names your charger, and says when it is too weak to keep up. Wi-Fi shows its strength in bars and turns orange when you are connected and the internet is not getting through; memory is coloured by macOS's own memory pressure and shows swap; storage warns you when space runs short; and live download and upload speeds sit beside them. A strip at the top of the panel explains any badge in the menu bar, such as Overloaded, the Energy tab lets you quit apps running in the background, and Gauge's menu bar icons now sit together, with the battery filling as it charges and far less energy used.

Larger, easier-to-read text through the panel and Settings, with a slightly wider panel so everything fits. The floating gauges stay as compact as they were. Studio Colour now appears under Out now in Settings › Support.

Licence checks go through Studio Grid's own server and Gauge accepts only its signed replies, so a faked answer can no longer unlock or lock the app. Gauge carries extra protection against tampering while it runs, and if the licence server cannot be reached it keeps working on the licence you already have.

A low battery stays on screen until you plug in. From 20% the menu bar carries an orange “Battery 18% · low” badge and from 10% a red “Battery 9% · plug in” one, with a banner at 10% and again at 5%. If banners are switched off, or macOS is not showing them, Gauge plays a warning sound so the alert is never silent. The AI number in the menu bar shows whichever limit you will reach first, session or weekly, keeps both in the tooltip, and rounds to match Claude's own figure.

Nothing appears on its own any more. A finished Claude session used to slide the tab out of the screen edge and tuck it back, which read as the app opening and closing at random while you worked. That is gone; the sound stays, with its own switch. Warnings reach you through the menu bar and a notification, and nothing else.

Settings keeps one look whatever the Light appearance setting is doing, so its text can no longer come out dark on a dark card. Colours that never adapted now do: the battery saver ring and the Wi-Fi mark hold their contrast in both appearances. A warning tells you in the menu bar instead of opening the panel over your work. Builds are verified before release, so an update always carries the changes it lists.

Alerts no longer open the panel. A session finishing or asking for you makes the tab peek out, and the panel opens only when you click it — there is a setting if you prefer the old behaviour.

The clock and the date now sit on one line at the top of Mac vitals, with the date in quiet grey rather than red.

Claude usage now reads exactly from Claude Desktop instead of an estimate, the Claude ring shows when a session is working or waiting on you, and the tab peeks out with a sound when one finishes. The tab corners are rounder, and the charge limit can no longer leave charging switched off.

The x at the top of the side panel now shows when your pointer is over it, so you can tuck the panel away straight away.

The side panel tucks itself away 10 seconds after you leave it, even with another app beside it, and the dropdown closes on its own again.

Run the battery down to your charge limit when you plug in above it. The battery icon opens Mac vitals in Vitals, Battery and Energy tabs, and colour-coded Wi-Fi joins it in the menu bar.

The charge limit works again on macOS 27, using the Mac's own limit, so it holds overnight, asleep and with Studio Gauge closed.

The flyout sits beside the tab instead of over it, Settings opens on General, and the app icon is in colour.

Battery health reads again on Apple silicon, hovering a ring keeps its flyout open, and the switches and sliders wear Studio purple.

Studio Gauge arrived as a free Mac app: your Mac vitals and your AI usage from a tab on the edge of your screen.

Studio Colour now uses the Studio Grid typefaces: Space Grotesk for headings, IBM Plex Sans for text and IBM Plex Mono for colour values. On the Wheel you can type the base hex directly and the other colours follow the harmony, and the welcome screen fits shorter panels. Cloud restores accept only Studio Colour data up to 5 MB, and image and page links must use http or https.

This update tightens security. Licence replies from our server are signed and checked, the extension no longer contacts Lemon Squeezy directly, and if a check can't complete you keep working offline for up to 21 days. The on-page pickers run sealed off from the page, inputs have size limits, and Studio Colour now needs Chrome 137 or later. The panel also moved to 16px white type, outline icons and plainer copy, and the light theme is now a clean black on white.

Studio Colour has a new icon, a bright fan of swatches. Buttons follow one system across every tab, with a solid purple button for the main action in each view. Colours pulled from a page are tagged with where the page uses them, and a new Copy on pick setting copies each colour the moment you pick it.

A broad polish pass across the whole panel. The contrast verdict stays readable whatever pair you test, and colour scales and UI states hold up when the base is near black or white. A working-colour chip in the top bar shows the colour you're working with, next-step links walk you from picking to exporting, and every empty state tells you what to do first. We added focus rings, support for reduced motion and a larger minimum text size, reworked the Wheel, Random, Glass, Extract, Tokens and colour-blind views, and moved the Adjust picker directly under the preview.

Every clickable control now has a hover state, and buttons share one hover style. Purple outlines stay soft at rest and turn full purple when you point at them or switch them on.

Free allowances are simpler: one monthly allowance for taking colour from pages and one for sending it out, with exports at 10 a month and saved gradients raised from 8 to 10 to match palettes. Secondary text is brighter and easier to read, and Settings now lists our screensaver pack, three free browser tools and Studio Gauge.

Studio Colour arrived on the Chrome Web Store, our first extension: pick colours from any page, check contrast, build gradients, and export CSS or design tokens from a side panel. The core is free, and Pro adds the on-page picker toolbar and lifts the monthly caps.

Save and load states, so your game picks up where you left off.

A free colour-stacking puzzle you play in the browser.

Email signatures and share cards, made in one free page.

A free launch playbook and working MV3 starter, sent to your inbox.

A free generator for CSS shadows and drop shadows.

A free checker that scans any live page and runs a PageSpeed test.

A browser groovebox for sequencing beats and melodies right in your tab.

A free image-mask tool with 64 shapes, formerly called Mask Forge.

A free bento-grid builder that exports native Bricks JSON.

A free mesh gradient maker that plays like a synth.

New guide: Colour Harmony, covering complementary, analogous and triadic schemes.

The Studio Grid blog opened with guides on colour, contrast and gradients.

Settings text took its colour from macOS rather than from Shelf, so on a Mac set to Light it came out grey on grey. It is fixed, and the window looks the same whatever your Mac is set to. Titles now sit a clear step above their descriptions, the window is wider so tool names stop truncating, there is a settings button under the + in the shelf, and the app icon is larger on the welcome and settings screens.

Drop images, PDFs or any file onto a note: they sit as thumbnails you can click to view full size. Lock a note and its text is encrypted on your Mac, opened with Touch ID. Daily backups of every note, kept on your Mac.

Shelf Sync now carries your notes properly in both directions, and the share menu stays put while you use it.