Frequently asked questions

During early access, yes. Pricing for the full release is being finalized — early access users will receive priority notification before any plan is introduced.

Not yet. BlurBox is macOS-only today. We're focused on building the best possible experience on macOS first.

macOS 14 (Sonoma) and later. See System requirements for the full list.

Not at the moment. We may open source parts of BlurBox in the future.

For now, download the latest version from the BlurBox website and replace the app in Applications. Automatic updates are coming in a future release.

Entirely on your Mac. BlurBox stores your overlay configuration in UserDefaults under your user account. Nothing is sent to any server.

No. BlurBox never reads, captures, or transmits anything that's on your screen. The blur effect is rendered locally by macOS's graphics system.

To know where windows are. When you glue an overlay to a Chrome window, BlurBox needs to know that window's position and size so the overlay can follow it as you move or resize it.

Accessibility access lets BlurBox query window geometry — but it does not let BlurBox read the contents of windows, your keystrokes, your clipboard, or any other private data.

No. BlurBox makes no network requests today. A future version may check for updates from our server, but you'll be able to disable that check in Preferences.

Yes. BlurBox is signed with a Developer ID certificate and notarized by Apple. You can verify it yourself with spctl -a -vvv /Applications/BlurBox.appin Terminal — the output should say “source=Notarized Developer ID”.

No. BlurBox draws an overlay on top of your screen. It doesn't peek at the pixels underneath, capture them, or send them anywhere. The blur is purely a visual effect rendered by macOS.

Most likely one of these:

• Accessibility permission isn't granted.Open System Settings → Privacy & Security → Accessibility and make sure BlurBox is toggled on.
• The overlay isn't glued.Right-click it and choose “Glue to Window Underneath.” A free-floating overlay stays where you put it; only glued overlays follow windows.
• The window changed identity. Some apps (like Chrome) replace a window when you tear off or merge tabs. The overlay loses track of the old window. Just unglue and re-glue.

Yes. Open System Settings → General → Login Items, click the +button, and add BlurBox. Or right-click BlurBox in your Dock while it's running and choose Options → Open at Login.

Practically unlimited — we've tested 20+ overlays without issues. Performance scales with the number of overlays and the complexity of the style (Lava Lamp is more expensive than Frosted Glass).

Yes. A BlurBox is a real on-screen window, so anything that captures your screen — screenshots, screen recordings, screen sharing — will include it. That's the whole point.

Yes — for the “share entire screen” mode. If you choose “share a specific window” instead, only that one window is captured and BlurBoxes won't appear (because they're separate windows). For the privacy use case, share the whole screen.

BlurBox works seamlessly across multiple displays. Drag overlays between monitors freely. When a glued window moves to a different display, its overlay follows along.

Mostly. macOS native full-screen mode puts an app in its own Space, which can disrupt window tracking. If a glued window enters full screen, the overlay may detach. We're working on improving this.

Frosted Glass is a static blur — clean, professional, low-CPU. Best for screen recording and presentations.

Lava Lamp is an animated, flowing blur with drifting color blobs. Decorative and eye-catching, but uses more CPU and battery. Best for streaming and showcasing.

Each level is a curated combination of blur strength, opacity, and glass tint. Subtle shows the content faintly through the blur. Private obscures most details but you can still see motion and rough shapes. Secure obscures nearly everything. Opaque blocks the content entirely. Try them on the homepage preview to see the difference.

Yes. Open Preferences (⌘,) and switch the privacy level to Custom. You'll get sliders for blur strength, opacity, and glass tint to dial in exactly the look you want.

Yes — that's click-through mode. Right-click a locked overlay and choose Click-Through. Mouse clicks will pass through the overlay to whatever's beneath it. Right-click still works on the overlay itself.

BlurBox saves overlay configuration to disk when you create or modify them. If you force-quit BlurBox before the save completed (or if macOS terminated it during shutdown), the most recent changes can be lost.

We've hardened the persistence layer in recent versions. If this still happens, please tell us — we want to know.

• Switch any Lava Lamp overlays to Frosted Glass — Lava Lamp has an ongoing animation, Frosted Glass doesn't.
• Reduce the number of overlays. Each one has a render cost.
• Quit and relaunch BlurBox. If memory has accumulated over a long session, this clears it.
• If the issue persists, please contact us with your Mac model, macOS version, and a description.

Chrome handles tabs and windows in unusual ways — when you tear off or merge a tab, Chrome may replace the entire window. This can confuse BlurBox's window tracking. The workaround: unglue, move the overlay over the new Chrome window, and re-glue. We're working on better handling for this.

Things to check:

• Conflict with another app. Raycast, Alfred, Rectangle, and other utilities sometimes register similar combos. Quit them temporarily to test.
• BlurBox isn't running.Look for the icon in your menu bar. If it's not there, open BlurBox from Applications.
• Modifier keys stuck. Sometimes macOS gets confused about which keys are pressed. Try pressing each modifier independently and releasing them.

• Quit BlurBox from the menu bar.
• Drag BlurBox.app from Applications to the Trash.
• To remove saved settings: defaults delete com.blurbox.BlurBox in Terminal.