vmuxMac
A native macOS terminal with tabs, themes, command palette, and a built-in shell.
What vmuxMac is
vmuxMac is the macOS member of the vmux family. It is a real Mac app: standard windows, a familiar menu bar, a Settings window, system clipboard, full-screen support, and Mission Control behavior you already know. Inside that Mac chrome it runs a high-performance native terminal that can launch a local shell on your Mac or connect out to remote hosts over SSH or Mosh, just like vmux on visionOS.
The Mac terminal is rendered by an embedded Ghostty engine, so input semantics, character drawing, selection, and shell integration match what serious terminal users already expect. Around that core, vmuxMac adds the things that make the rest of the vmux family pleasant to live in: a fast Cmd+Shift+P command palette, tabbed windows, theme and font picking, a built-in vsh shell for managing connections, and shared profiles with the iPhone, Vision Pro, and CLI apps.
Highlights
- Native AppKit windows, full-screen, Spaces, and split-view that behave like every other Mac app.
- Tabbed terminals plus separate windows; new windows take a single keystroke.
- Cmd+Shift+P command palette with fuzzy search and recent commands.
- Built-in
vshshell for quick connections, settings changes, and pane control without ever leaving the keyboard. - Local shell sessions (your default
$SHELL,zsh,bash,fish) plus SSH and Mosh. - Themes and Nerd Fonts shared with the rest of the vmux apps.
- One-click Ghostty config import for users migrating from Ghostty.
- Hidden title bar, focus-follows-mouse, configurable padding, and bracketed paste.
- Bell sound, scrollback clear, copy and paste, and standard Cmd shortcuts.
Who it is for
vmuxMac is for anyone who lives in a Mac terminal. If you already use Terminal.app, iTerm2, or Ghostty, you can switch to vmuxMac and keep all of your habits. If you also use vmux on Vision Pro or iPhone, vmuxMac becomes the desk-bound endpoint of the same family and shares your saved hosts, themes, and fonts.
System requirements
| Requirement | Minimum |
|---|---|
| macOS | macOS 14 Sonoma or later (Apple silicon and Intel) |
| Disk | About 60 MB |
| Memory | No special requirements |
| Network | Required only for SSH and Mosh sessions |
| Optional | A Mac with a Touch ID sensor if you want biometric App Lock |
vmuxMac is sandboxed and ships through the Mac App Store. Direct downloads, when available, are notarized for Gatekeeper.
How vmuxMac compares
| Feature | vmuxMac | vmux (visionOS) | vmuxPhone | Terminal.app |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Local shell | Yes | No | No | Yes |
| SSH | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes (manual) |
| Mosh | Yes | Yes | Yes | Requires extra install |
| Tabs | Yes | Tabs and panes | Single pane | Tabs |
| Command palette | Yes | Yes | Yes | No |
| Themes shared with vmux family | Yes | Yes | Yes | No |
| Custom keybinds | Yes | Yes | Yes | Limited |
Built-in vsh shell | Yes | Yes | Yes | No |
| Ghostty config import | Yes | No | No | No |
| Spatial windows | No | Yes | No | No |
vmuxMac is the right answer when you are at your desk. Use vmux on visionOS when you want spatial terminals around the room, and vmuxPhone when you are away from your Mac.
What is not on Mac
A few features from vmux on visionOS are intentionally omitted on macOS, because they only make sense in a spatial environment:
- VKeyboard (the floating spatial keyboard)
- Battlestation Mode and Pane Tabs window styles
- Optic ID lock (vmuxMac uses Touch ID on supported Macs)
- CRT effects and glass background. The terminal is currently rendered through libghostty, which uses native drawing; the CRT pipeline is paused on macOS until a future update routes drawing back through the vmux Metal renderer. The toggles still appear in some places for parity, but have no visible effect today.
Where to go next
- Getting started walks through your first window.
- Connecting covers SSH, Mosh, saved hosts, and key authentication on the Mac.
- Windows and tabs explains the window model, tabs, and what the menu bar does.
- Command palette lists every command available through Cmd+Shift+P.
- Themes and fonts is the picker reference and Ghostty migration guide.
- Shell (vsh) is the Mac quick-start for the built-in shell.
- Settings walks through every tab.
- Troubleshooting is the place to look when something is wrong.