WinOptimize
Twenty-six apps, two telemetry services and five scheduled tasks collecting data. You chose none of it. Watch what happens when you run the optimizer.
The app's actual window. It ships in English and Spanish, switched from the window itself.
Caches, Xcode builds, stale simulators and snapshots nobody shows you. MacOptimize finds them, tells you what each one is, and takes them out — without deleting anything.
The MacOptimize window. The figures come from a real run.
Windows has restore points. macOS does not. A Time Machine snapshot keeps the whole disk, but getting one file out means booting into Recovery — as an undo, that is useless.
So the app brings its own way back. Everything it removes waits in its own quarantine, with a record of where each thing came from, and goes back with one button.
It does not do twenty things halfway. It does four, each with its own colour — the same one you will see inside the app.
Eleven targets: caches, Xcode's DerivedData, unused simulators, Homebrew, npm, Trash, iOS backups and local snapshots. Each with its real size on disk.
The app and what it leaves across eleven folders in your Library. It shows you the list before touching anything and you can untick what does not belong. It clears its Dock icon too.
launchd agents and daemons, each showing who signs its binary. An Adobe agent signed by Adobe is expected; one with no valid signature, somebody has to be able to explain.
A list of everything the app removed, with its original path and which action produced it. One button per item puts it back. It is the one section you hope never to need.
macOS compresses memory and manages it on its own. A «free up RAM» button is exactly the move that makes Mac cleaners look like a scam. You will not find one here.
With APFS and FileVault in the way it is not feasible. The Windows version does it; this one does not, and promising it would be a lie.
SIP protects everything under /System, and rightly so. Agents there are not even listed: a button that always fails is worse than no button.
No account, no serial, no subscription. And no telemetry: an app that sells itself on removing the system's cannot bring its own.
Free and complete. No account, no serial, no subscription and nothing locked behind a payment.
Download · 2.0 MBThis is an unsigned beta, so macOS will say it is damaged. It is not: that is what it says about any downloaded app without an Apple certificate. Installing it needs one Terminal command — the step by step is right below.
None of these warnings says the file is infected. They say that Apple does not know who published it, because signing an app costs 99 dollars a year and I have not paid it yet.
1 · Install
Open the .dmg and drag MacOptimize into the Applications folder, like any other app. This step gives no trouble.
2 · macOS will say it is damaged
When you open it you will see «MacOptimize is damaged and can’t be opened. You should move it to the Trash». It is not damaged. That is the message macOS uses for any downloaded app without an Apple certificate, and it does not tell a broken app apart from an unsigned one.
Dismiss that dialog without moving it to the Trash. Then open Terminal and paste this:
xattr -dr com.apple.quarantine /Applications/MacOptimize.appThat removes the «came from the internet» label macOS puts on everything you download. It does not modify the app or touch system security: what gets removed is the label, and only for this one file. After that it opens normally, for good.
And if that makes you uneasy, good: running commands that skip security warnings is exactly what should not be done lightly. That is what step 4 is for — check the file is the one I published before you touch it. Once I sign the app — it costs 99 dollars a year — this step goes away.
3 · Full Disk Access
Without that permission the app cannot see sandboxed apps caches, Mail, or iOS backups: those targets will read zero. You grant it in System Settings → Privacy & Security → Full Disk Access. The app tells you and opens the panel for you.
4 · Check it yourself
You do not have to take my word for it. Check that the file you downloaded is exactly the one I published: open Terminal and run this.
shasum -a 256 ~/Downloads/MacOptimize-0.9.0.dmgIt has to give you this SHA-256 fingerprint:
CB257C6CD16F8451E1EFDC65A4FE029BA618E342754385B66E186BB532E4444A
Live optimization
Every icon on that desktop ships with a clean install. Press the button and see how it ends up. Then, if you want, bring them all back.
State: beforeReady to run — 33 items
Store, Terminal, Photos, Calculator, Notepad and Snipping Tool are left alone.
Finish setting up your device with OneDrive and Microsoft 365
Removing what you never wanted is half of it. The other half are the measurement and repair tools that come in the same window, each with its own colour.
Temperature per core, SMART health with SSD wear, and what is filling your drive.
A purpose-built NTFS and exFAT engine: it tells you, file by file, whether it can still be rescued.
14 configuration checks, the CVEs you have yet to patch, and the fix in one click.
Which ports are open and which process owns them. Seven-step network repair.
Which IP each process talks to, who signed it, and event log errors explained in plain language.
DISM and SFC, drivers for your board and your graphics card, startup manager and batch uninstaller.
The rollback button restores telemetry, services, tasks, Copilot and the taskbar. Deleted apps you reinstall yourself from the Store.
You will see the names of deleted files, but they come out full of zeros. The SSD already erased them physically and no tool recovers that.
Windows manages RAM on its own. It helps after closing heavy apps, and not much more. Anyone promising double the memory is lying.
It does not change your Windows edition or touch your licence. It optimises the system you already have, and nothing else.
Free and complete. No account, no serial, no subscription and nothing locked behind a payment.
Download · 6.1 MBWindows will show you one or more warnings while installing, because the file is not signed yet. That is expected and does not mean it is infected: the step-by-step is right below.
None of these warnings says the file is infected. They all say the same thing in different words: they do not know who published it. Signing an installer — which is what puts a name on the publisher — costs money, and I have not done it yet.
1 · While downloading
Your browser may say the file is not commonly downloaded and hide the button. In Chrome or Edge, open the download's menu and choose Keep. If it offers Keep anyway, pick that.
2 · When you open it
The blue SmartScreen dialog shows up. The button to continue is hidden: click More info and only then does Run anyway appear.
3 · If Windows deletes it by itself
Your antivirus may quarantine it and the file just vanishes. To get it back: Windows Security → Virus & threat protection → Protection history, find WinOptimize in the list and choose Allow on device.
Do not turn off your antivirus and do not add whole folders as exclusions. Allowing this one file is enough, and the rest of your machine stays protected.
Why it happens: the app turns off telemetry, removes preinstalled apps and disables services. Seen from the outside, with no idea what they are, those actions look like the ones a harmful program performs, and some antivirus engines flag them by resemblance rather than by finding anything.
I already went through that: I sent 1.8.1 to Microsoft for analysis and on 4 August 2026 they classified it as not malware. Version 1.8.3 is that same code with fixes, but it is a new file and has not been re-analysed yet, so the warning may come back until it is.
4 · Check it yourself
You do not have to take my word for it. Check that the file you downloaded is exactly the one I published: open PowerShell in your downloads folder and run this.
Get-FileHash .\WinOptimize-Setup-1.8.3.exeIt has to give you this SHA-256 fingerprint:
B9D201D9F69163C8B0E3C614B3ED0EFB8B7D50C6E13E8C9D3CA53A2914C58FF1