AeroSpace vs Swish vs NeoTiler: three of the most popular window managers for Mac, three very different price points. AeroSpace is free, Swish is $19.99, NeoTiler is $9.99 lifetime. We tested all three apps.
I’ve been on Mac for years now after coming from Windows, and I still stand by it as one of the best environments to actually get work done in. That doesn’t mean it’s perfect, though, every system has its blind spots, and window management is one of Apple’s. Put AeroSpace and Swish side by side and it becomes obvious fast: the native tiling Apple ships just wasn’t built with power users in mind.
Quick Comparison
| Feature | AeroSpace | Swish | NeoTiler |
|---|---|---|---|
| Basic Window Snapping | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Custom Snap Areas | Config Only | ✗ | ✓ |
| Smart Workspaces | ✗ | ✗ | ✓ |
| Mouse & Trackpad Gestures | ✗ | Trackpad Only | ✓ |
| Shake to Focus | ✗ | ✗ | ✓ |
| Advanced App Switcher | ✗ | ✗ | ✓ |
| Windows-Style Taskbar | ✗ | ✗ | ✓ |
| Zero Data Collection | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Price | Free / Open Source | $16-$20 | $9.99 Lifetime |
Apple introduced macOS Sequoia’s window tiling feature in September 2024, but for people who use such features at a high level, it remained quite basic. Especially Apple’s assignment of shortcuts to the non-standard globe key and not allowing these shortcuts to be changed leads many professionals to seek third-party solutions.
So, which is truly the best window manager for Mac in 2026? Let’s take a close look at the three strongest players.
AeroSpace: The Open Source Powerhouse
What sold me on AeroSpace pretty quickly is how little it asks of your system. It’s free, fully open source, and instead of you dragging windows around, it takes over the moment you open something and slots it into a grid automatically, no half-screens or quarter-screens to eyeball, the tiling just happens.
Resource usage stays light even after weeks of uptime, which matters more than people give it credit for. And unlike Rectangle or half the paid apps in this space, there’s no upsell waiting for you somewhere, one download, one free package, that’s the whole product.
Where it earns its keep is the config file. Every keybinding, every rule for which app opens where, all of it lives in a TOML file you edit by hand. What impressed me most was watching the entire layout reflow the instant I closed a window, no lag, no half-finished animation, just an immediate recalculation.
Where it loses people is the same place it wins them. There’s no settings window, nothing to click through, and the maintainers are upfront that this is built for advanced users and developers, not a general audience. It’s also still in public beta, so don’t be shocked if something changes under you between updates.
Swish: Simplicity and Flawless Experience
What sets Swish apart from the other two right away is that you can grab it straight from the Mac App Store, sandboxed and all. That alone earns it points with people who don’t like installing software from anywhere else. Its whole identity is built around trackpad gestures instead of dragging or shortcuts, put two fingers on a title bar, swipe right, and the window snaps to half the screen, swipe toward a corner and it takes a quarter. It runs $16 to $20 as a one-time purchase, and it’s clearly made for people who never put their hands anywhere but the trackpad.
A few more things worth knowing before you buy. There are close to 30 gestures total, going well beyond snapping into minimizing, hiding, and quitting apps. If you’re on a regular mouse instead of a trackpad, support only comes through a third-party workaround, not anything built in. And it’s worth flagging a complaint that keeps coming up in reviews, running it alongside BetterTouchTool can freeze the trackpad entirely until you quit one of the two.
One thing I’ll give it credit for: the developer states plainly in their legal page that Swish doesn’t store or collect any user data at all, the app only talks to the internet to check your license and look for updates. That’s a rare, clean stance for a paid utility, and it’s genuinely appreciated.
NeoTiler: Natural, Libertarian Approach
Finally, I want to talk about my own application, NeoTiler. I want to clearly explain to you what I offer alongside the other two. As an application released in 2026, my goal in NeoTiler was to offer the user as much freedom as possible. If there is a default setting that cannot be changed because it didn’t occur to me in the first moments, I will definitely grant the user the right to change it with my libertarian philosophy. Because what distinguishes us window management applications from Apple is the right to change that we offer to the user.
Neotiler Preview Video
In NeoTiler, which I developed entirely with Swift, I aimed for native performance and to have it stand as a natural Apple system application alongside freedom. I want to offer people the opportunity to try this beauty by offering it at a single price of $9.99 with a lifetime understanding and without a free-pro distinction.
The honest question is: Swish alone costs $16-$20, and AeroSpace makes you live in a config file to get half of what NeoTiler does out of the box. NeoTiler includes Custom Snap Areas and Smart Workspaces, plus Mouse & Trackpad Gestures that work perfectly on every single Mac model (including desktop setups like Mac Mini and Mac Studio), Shake to Focus, Advanced App Switcher, and a Windows-style taskbar. Lower price than Swish, no subscription, no config file to fight with, no free-pro split.
As for the gesture feature specifically. Most window managers require a trackpad. NeoTiler works with both mouse and trackpad on all Mac models. This matters more than it sounds if you’re on a desktop setup.
I also found Apple’s Cmd + Tab combination insufficient, so I built a more advanced version into the app. The part I find lacking in the original is that Apple only indicates you’ve switched to that window without bringing it to the foreground or if it’s minimized somewhere, it doesn’t surface it properly. That’s the gap I filled.
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