A lock for your apps
Choose the apps you want kept private. When someone opens one, it hides at once and a small card drops from the notch. Unlock it with Touch ID or your PIN.
Signed and notarized by Apple
Free and open source · 6 downloads · macOS 14 Sonoma or later
Want to help? Read the contribution guide
How it works
Step 1
Choose from the apps installed on your Mac. Lock as few or as many as you like.
Step 2
A locked app hides the moment it opens. The unlock card drops down from the notch instead.
Step 3
Touch the sensor, or type your PIN. The app comes right back where you left it.
Features
Fortify keeps the apps you choose out of sight until you unlock them. It starts at login, lives in the menu bar, and follows your Mac’s light or dark appearance.
Chat apps, mail, browsers, notes, System Settings, and web apps installed from Chrome, Brave, Edge or Safari. Your apps are grouped by category; right-click one to move it.
A small card drops from the top of the screen. Use Touch ID, or a PIN that works even with the lid closed.
The screen is covered the moment a locked app opens, including apps in full screen or on another desktop.
When you minimize, hide or close an unlocked app, when your Mac sleeps, or when the screen locks. Full-screen apps on another Space stay unlocked for the time you set.
Press ⌃⌘L in an unlocked app to lock it straight away and go back to the app you were in. Change it or turn it off in Settings. Or choose Lock All from the menu bar.
No account, no analytics, no update checks: Fortify has no network access at all. Your PIN is kept only as a salted PBKDF2 hash.
Compare
Other app lockers charge a subscription for one simple job. Fortify does it for free, and you can read every line of it.
| FortifyApp lock | AppCryptApp lock | AppLockerApp lock | 1PasswordPassword manager | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | $19.99 / year | $11.99 / year | $47.88 / year |
| Over 3 years | $0 | $59.97 | $35.97 | $143.64 |
| Pay once instead | Nothing to pay | $39.99 | $17.99 | Not offered |
| Locks other apps on your Mac | Yes | Yes | Yes | NoOnly its own vault |
| Open source | YesMIT | No | No | No |
Prices checked on
Prices for one Mac, in US dollars. 1Password is the Individual plan; it locks its own vault, not other apps. Prices change, so check: AppCrypt, AppLocker, 1Password.
Open source
Fortify: App Lock is MIT licensed and built in the open at github.com/aadityesh/fortify.
$0
Open the disk image and drag Fortify into Applications. Requires macOS 14 Sonoma or later.
Opens the latest release on GitHub. Pick the .dmg.
Rather not run a download? Clone the repo and build it with Xcode 16 or later.
git clone https://github.com/aadityesh/fortify
cd fortify
./scripts/install.shBug reports, ideas and pull requests are welcome. The contribution guide shows how to set up, test and send a change.
FAQ
Download Fortify, set a PIN, and switch on the apps you want to lock: Messages, WhatsApp, Mail, Photos, Notes, your browser or any other app. From then on, opening one of them brings up a card asking for Touch ID or your PIN before the app appears.
Yes. Fortify is free and open source under the MIT license. Every feature is included, with no account, no trial and no limit on how many apps you lock.
macOS only lets one app hide another if you allow it under Accessibility. Fortify uses that permission for one job: keeping locked apps hidden. It hides a locked app the moment it opens, and notices when one you unlocked is minimized or closed so it can lock it again. It looks at which windows are open, not what’s in them, and doesn’t read your keystrokes.
No. Fortify has no network access at all: no account, no analytics, no telemetry and no update checks. You can read the source on GitHub to check.
The app is signed with a Developer ID and notarized by Apple, so it opens like any other download. If you’d rather not run a download, build it yourself from the source on GitHub.
Click “Forgot PIN?” on the unlock card, confirm with your Mac password, and choose a new PIN. Touch ID keeps working the whole time.
Fortify is a privacy lock for when someone else is using your Mac: a friend, a colleague, a child. It isn’t encryption. Someone signed in to your macOS account with enough time and know-how could force-quit it or read app data from disk. To protect the data itself, turn on FileVault and give other people their own user account.
Yes. On a Mac without a notch, the unlock card still shows at the top center of the screen.
A Mac with macOS 14 Sonoma or later, on Apple silicon or Intel. Touch ID is optional: you can always unlock with your PIN.
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