Why I Built AppAudit: The macOS App Inventory Tool I Needed and Couldn’t Find

Getting a new Mac is exciting right up until you realize you must figure out what’s on the old one. Before my last Mac migration, I sat down to do what seemed like a straightforward job: go through what was installed on my old machine, decide what apps to bring over, and leave the rest behind. I’d been using that old Mac for years. It had apps from projects I’d long moved on from, utilities I’d installed once for a specific task and never thought about again. And, being the inquisitive HighTechDad that I am, I download, install, and test apps all the time. That equates to app clutter (or even digital hoarding). My original plan was to review everything that was installed properly before I moved anything.

I opened Apple System Information, the built-in macOS tool for viewing what’s installed (along with a ton of other useful information). It showed me a list of applications on my Mac. What it wouldn’t let me do was take notes, check things off, filter by anything I actually cared about, or export the results in a form I could use outside the app. The print options were rough enough that I gave up on them quickly. (I checked today to see if the functionality had improved, but in the print preview, it showed that I would have to print out 75 pages!)

So, I did what you do when the right tool doesn’t exist: I took screenshots of my apps from the System Information screen and Finder, and built a manual checklist, working through the list app by app while keeping a separate document open for notes. It got the job done. But the whole time, I kept thinking that someone should have built something better than this for such a common task. When I looked for that tool back then, I couldn’t find it.

That was years ago. I thought about it off and on over the years, and eventually I stopped waiting for someone else to build it.

Then vibe coding came into the picture. And I realized I could “code” the Mac app I had been waiting for over all these years.

AppAudit is what I built.

The Mac App Accumulation Problem Is Real

Macs collect apps quietly, or maybe you do it actively. Not all at once, just over time and regular use. A trial here, a utility you downloaded for one specific job, an app you moved to a different folder during a cleanup project without realizing the original was still sitting in Applications. If you moved from an Intel Mac to Apple Silicon at some point, there’s also a set of older apps running through Rosetta 2 that you’ve probably never taken a close look at, because they work and there hasn’t been a reason to. Until migration planning forces the question, and Apple just made that question unavoidable. Rosetta support ends with macOS 28, meaning Intel-only apps will stop running on Apple Silicon Macs entirely. If you have no idea which of your apps fall into that category, you are not alone, but you are also running out of time to treat it as someone else’s problem.

macOS can show you some of this if you know where to look, but nothing in the system is designed for doing an actual app review. System Information gives you a list. Finder lets you browse. Neither one surfaces duplicate copies, highlights which apps are Intel-only, or lets you take notes as you go. There’s nothing to export when you’re done, which means any review work you do disappears when you close the window. The information is in there somewhere. Getting it into a usable shape is where the whole process breaks down.

This is especially obvious when you’re prepping for a Mac migration. You need to know what’s installed on your old Mac before deciding what to bring with you to your new one. Without a clear inventory, you’re either guessing or copying everything over and sorting it out later on the new machine. Most people figure it out later and then spend months wondering why the new Mac feels just as cluttered and even sluggish as their old one. Been there. Experienced that.

What AppAudit Does

AppAudit scans your installed app bundles and builds an organized, readable inventory of what’s on your Mac. For each app, you get the name, icon, version, path, size, key dates, architecture, and any review notices worth paying attention to. When AppAudit finds multiple copies of the same application, it groups them into a single row, keeping the main list clean while making the duplicates visible and easy to review.

The part that was completely missing from everything I tried during my previous migrations was the organization layer. With AppAudit, you can add notes directly to apps as you review them. That sounds like a small thing, and in some ways, it is, but it completely changes how the review feels. Instead of bouncing between a scanner and a separate note-taking app, everything is in one place and organized. You can create custom lists for whatever grouping makes sense: a reinstall plan for the new Mac, a “not sure yet” holding area, and a list for apps you want to revisit. AppAudit Free allows you to create up to three custom lists. AppAudit Pro removes that limit entirely and adds deeper filtering and flagging for more targeted review work.

Architecture visibility is the feature I pull up most often on my own machines. AppAudit indicates whether each app is Apple Silicon-native, Universal, or Intel-only. That’s directly useful information if you’re on an M-series Mac and want to understand which apps are still running through Rosetta 2. It’s not always obvious from the app itself, and going through “Get Info” on every app in your library to check is nobody’s idea of a productive afternoon. It’s pretty darn boring. Trust me, I’ve done it.

The AppAudit features page has a complete breakdown of this feature and a bunch of others. And, if you want to see some of the features in action, head over to my YouTube page where I have an AppAudit Feature Walkthrough playlist.

Free, Pro, and Consultant Licenses

As I was working out the features and structure of AppAudit, I immediately decided that AppAudit would be a single download. Free, Pro, and Consultant are all in the same installed app, and Pro unlocks when you enter a valid license (more about the Consultant license in a few paragraphs). No separate download, no reinstalling anything to get more features. I wanted the app to simply unlock additional features based on the end user’s needs.

AppAudit Free is a working utility, not a limited preview. It includes the core inventory workflow, duplicate detection, search, sorting, notes, and up to three custom lists. If you want a clear, organized picture of what’s installed on your Mac before you do anything else, Free handles that completely. I wanted Free to be genuinely useful on its own, and I think (hope) it is.

AppAudit Pro adds depth for the workflows that call for it. That means copy-level inspection, so you can examine each discovered duplicate individually rather than just knowing duplicates exist; deeper filters; export options in CSV, Markdown, and JSON; and the Compare Workspace. Compare Workspace lets you load two inventory snapshots side by side and see exactly what changed between them. That’s useful for migration tracking, documentation, or understanding how a machine has drifted or changed over time. Pro also includes Verify Signature and Inspect Security Profile for app-level security review, plus a guarded Move to Trash workflow for eligible app bundles.

AppAudit Consultant builds on Pro and is designed for people who do Mac support and consulting work (or the household tech support person, like me). It adds the ability to generate time-limited customer-use licenses, so you can extend Pro access to a client during a support engagement without requiring them to purchase a permanent license. When that access period ends, the app automatically returns to the standard free experience. No ongoing obligations for the client. The AppAudit editions page covers the full comparison.

One decision I made early that I feel good about: AppAudit is a one-time purchase, not a subscription. I looked at how people actually use a tool like this (occasional migrations, periodic cleanups, that “what’s on this Mac?” moment before selling or passing on a device), and a recurring charge just didn’t fit. You’re not opening AppAudit every week. Charging you monthly for something you might use a few times a year felt wrong to me, and, honestly, I find subscription creep as annoying as anyone else. One license, one Mac, one purchase. If you want to use it on a second machine, that’s a second license. Simple and fair in both directions.

Where AppAudit Actually Gets Used

The migration use case is where AppAudit started for me and where it still makes the biggest difference, I believe. You scan your current Mac, build a list of what you plan to bring over, add notes where something needs a second look, and filter out what you know you’re leaving behind. You end up with a working document for the transition instead of a folder full of screenshots and a sticky note that says, “check the apps thing.” With a Pro license, this goes even further: you can export a CSV file of all apps or a selected list, which you can import into your favorite spreadsheet app.

Duplicate cleanup is something I come back to regularly. My older machines had duplicates hiding in places I didn’t think to look: cloud storage folders, old backup locations, the Downloads folder. AppAudit can scan beyond the standard Applications folder when you grant the right access, so it finds things a Finder browse would miss entirely. When I see a grouped duplicate count in the inventory, I can drill into it, identify which copy is correct, and understand where the extras came from. That used to require a manual expedition through the filesystem. Even new apps seem to create new versions of themselves (e.g., changing from Universal apps to Apple Silicon ones), but often, they don’t even “tell you” they did that.

Sorting by last-opened date is one of those simple features that reveals more than you’d expect. On most Macs that have been in use for a few years, there’s a cluster of apps that haven’t been touched in a long time but look perfectly normal sitting in the list. Seeing them collected at the top of a sorted view is a different experience from knowing they’re probably somewhere in there. And for anyone on Apple Silicon who hasn’t sorted out the Intel-only situation yet, that filter makes the whole picture visible without any manual digging. (A quick note on this feature: the “last opened” date is only based on the latest AppAudit scan you performed; it’s not real time.)

Privacy-Forward and Why It Lives Entirely on Your Mac

AppAudit doesn’t require an account. Your scan results and review work stay on your Mac unless you choose to export something. There’s no background update checking, no silent network traffic while you’re reviewing your apps. If you want to look for a new version, you go to Help and check manually. That’s the only time the app touches the network. You do have to provide your name and email when you download the Free version or purchase a license, but creating an account is not part of that process.

I designed and built AppAudit this way because it does something fairly detailed and potentially private: scanning what’s installed on your machine. That’s a meaningful picture of your setup, and I didn’t want to build something that automatically sends it anywhere. A lot of utility software defaults to cloud connectivity, and for some tools that’s the right call. For an app inventory tool, I don’t think it is. Local data should stay local unless there’s a clear reason to move it. I wanted AppAudit to be as privacy-forward as possible without compromising functionality.

License validation is also local. When you enter a Pro or Consultant license, it is validated within the app without an activation call to a server. I find activation-required software frustrating, especially for tools I might want to use somewhere with unreliable internet, so I built AppAudit the way I’d actually want to use it.

The only time AppAudit actually connects to the Internet is when the end-user initiates it, and that is with the “Check for Updates…” feature. I didn’t want random polling in the background, and I didn’t want to have to block or unblock connections (something I regularly do in my own workflow).

One thing I wanted AppAudit to handle differently from most utilities is the conversation about permissions. macOS will ask for certain access when you use AppAudit, and instead of leaving you to figure out why, the app has a built-in System Permissions Review screen that explains each relevant permission in plain language: what it is, whether it’s recommended or just optional, and exactly where to find it in macOS Settings if you decide to allow it. There’s no pressure. AppAudit still runs a useful scan without every possible permission; it just tells you what broader access would add to the coverage. You’re in the driver’s seat the whole time.

AppAudit Version 0.5.6, in Public Beta

AppAudit is in public beta at version 0.5.6 as of the writing of this article. The core product is solid and in active use. This release improved the manual update experience with clearer in-app messaging and better retry behavior, while keeping everything user-initiated throughout. There’s also infrastructure work in this release that doesn’t appear on the features page but matters when you’re running a direct-license software product.

The 0.5.6-beta release notes are on the site if you want the specifics. I keep the release notes as up to date as possible as new versions come out.

Frequently Asked Questions About AppAudit

Why Did I Create AppAudit?

A few years ago, I was frustrated that there wasn’t an app purpose-built to help people understand what was installed on their Mac. Back then, I scraped together a manual “solution” for this pain I was experiencing and wondered if others were feeling the same way. I just moved on and got the job done… manually.

Fast forward to today, and AI has given me the “superpowers” to actually create the application I needed way back then. The pain points haven’t gone away; if anything, people are installing more apps than ever (yes, some of those are vibe-coded), migrating to new Macs, and cluttering up their devices along the way. I moved from “this tool should exist; why doesn’t it?” to “I’m just going to build it myself.”  

I figured that sharing my solution may help others as well. I put a lot of blood, sweat, and tears into developing AppAudit so that end users wouldn’t have to suffer through migrations or application clutter the way I did.

Take some time to learn more at tryappaudit.com. And contact me if you have any questions (or even feature ideas).

HTD says: AppAudit fills a real gap that macOS doesn’t address on its own. If you’ve ever tried to inventory your apps before a migration and ended up doing it by hand, this is what you actually need. It doesn’t require an account, everything stays local, and the free version is worth downloading before you spend anything. I built it to scratch my own itch, and it turned into something I hope other Mac users will appreciate.