We read The Boring Notch's GitHub repository and every page that rates it on October 20, 2026. It has 11,084 stars and its latest stable build has been downloaded 920,538 times. That build is from November 24, 2025, it is not notarized, and 257 issues are open.
How Boring Notch is rated
Boring Notch is free and lives on GitHub. It is not on the Mac App Store, MacUpdate or Trustpilot that we could find. This is its standing, read on October 20, 2026.
GPL-3.0. 257 issues open and 669 closed. v2.7.3, the latest stable, has 920,538 downloads.
The one review likes that it is free and just works, and finds it less pretty than the paid apps.
The review, from November 2024, praises its animations as fast and smooth.
The four problems that keep coming back
We read Boring Notch's issues and grouped them by what went wrong. Each links to the issue, so you can read the whole thread.
The notch disappears after sleep.
After a long sleep the notch is gone, and only a force quit and relaunch brings it back. With 45 comments, the most-discussed open issue.
Issue #336January 24, 2025, open
The same report again, and a notch that wakes up in the wrong place.
Issue #370, Issue #2792025, closed as duplicates
If Droppy ever stops showing up after wake, report it on The Trench, our public bug board: every report has a visible status, and the fix is listed in the changelog of the release that ships it.
Battery and memory use.
On v2.7.3 and macOS 26.4.1, an M4 MacBook Air showed a very high 12-hour energy figure for Boring Notch.
Issue #1260May 17, 2026, open
A new user saw 336 MB of memory and asked for something closer to 100 MB.
Issue #1637September 30, 2026, open
About 5% battery an hour while idle on an M4 MacBook Pro.
Issue #338January 25, 2025, closed
Droppy is a native Swift and SwiftUI app, and every extension stays off until you turn it on, so what you do not use does not run.
Music breaks when macOS updates.
The Apple Music source broke on macOS 26; only the generic Now Playing source kept working.
Issue #779September 16, 2025, open
The music live activity broke after macOS 15.4.
Issue #434March 12, 2025, closed
Spotify's like button does not work.
Issue #929open
Droppy plays Apple Music, Spotify and browser media, with live lyrics, the Apple Music queue and a floating player. Beta and nightly channels let you take a fix as soon as it is built.
Installing an unsigned app.
Users run the app from the disk image because nothing tells them to drag it to Applications.
Issue #905December 10, 2025
The app will not run again after reinstalling.
Issue #1351June 27, 2026
The README itself says the app is not notarized, and that Open Anyway fails for some users, including those without admin rights.
READMEOctober 2026
Droppy is signed and notarized by Apple. Download it, drag it to Applications, open it. No Terminal, no quarantine flag.
What Boring Notch users love
Free, open, and it just works.
The Product Hunt reviewer likes that the whole codebase is public and calls the app free, light and dependable.
Product Hunt4 stars, 2025
The AlternativeTo reviewer calls the animations beautiful, fast and smooth.
AlternativeTo5 stars, November 16, 2024
Droppy 16 made its shelf and island animations interruptible, so they never make you wait. It is not open source, but DroppyKit, its extension SDK, and its droplet store are public, and the 3-day trial costs nothing.
| On October 20, 2026 | Boring Notch | Droppy |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free, donations | $9.99 once, 2 Macs |
| Signed and notarized | No | Yes |
| Latest stable | v2.7.3, November 24, 2025 | Stable, beta and nightly channels |
| Homebrew | The team's own tap, at 2.7.3 | brew install --cask droppy |
| Clipboard history | No | Yes |
| Support | GitHub issues | Email, Discord, The Trench |
Our verdict: Boring Notch is the best free start, but it has stood still for a year.
- 11,084 stars and close to a million downloads: people like it, and it costs nothing.
- The latest stable is from November 2025, it is not notarized, and 257 issues are open, led by a notch that vanishes after sleep.
- Battery use and music sources that break with macOS updates come up again and again.
- If you want a notch app that is signed, maintained and answered, Droppy is $9.99 once and you can try every feature free for 3 days.
Questions people ask about Boring Notch
Is Boring Notch safe?
Boring Notch is open source under GPL-3.0, so anyone can read its code on GitHub, and the official repository is TheBoredTeam/boring.notch. It is not signed or notarized: its README says the team has no Apple Developer account, so macOS blocks it until you remove the quarantine flag or choose Open Anyway.
Is Boring Notch free?
Yes. Boring Notch is free and open source, with a Ko-fi link for donations. It installs from its GitHub releases or from the team's own Homebrew tap.
What do people complain about most in Boring Notch?
In its GitHub issues: the notch disappearing after sleep until you force quit it (the most-commented open issue), battery and memory use, music sources that break with macOS updates, and installing an unsigned app.
Is Boring Notch still updated?
Its latest stable release is v2.7.3 from November 24, 2025. Nothing was released for about ten months after that; v2.8 release candidates started on September 23, 2026, and commits continued throughout.
Does Boring Notch work on Intel Macs?
Its README says macOS 14 Sonoma or later, on Apple silicon or Intel.
Is there a good alternative to Boring Notch?
Droppy covers the same ground (notch, music, HUDs, a file tray) and adds clipboard history, Droppy Cloud share links, live activities and 36 optional extensions. It is signed and notarized, installs from getdroppy.app or Homebrew, costs $9.99 once for 2 Macs and has a 3-day free trial.
Sources
Read on October 20, 2026: The Boring Notch's repository, its README, issues and releases through the GitHub API, Product Hunt, AlternativeTo, and the team's Homebrew tap. We could not read Reddit directly or confirm Softpedia's rating. Issues are paraphrased and linked. This page is written by Droppy, which competes with Boring Notch; we say so and give every source so you can check our reading. Boring Notch is a trademark of its owners.