Activity Monitor helps you investigate. Better Resource Monitor helps you notice sooner.

xeliape — Mon, 27 Apr 2026 11:11:25 +0000

Most Mac monitoring comparisons end up in the same place: Stats vs iStat Menus.

That comparison is fine, but I think it misses a simpler question:

Are you looking for a full diagnostics dashboard, or do you just want something small that helps you spot trouble before it interrupts your work?

That second category is where Better Resource Monitor fits.

It’s a menu bar app by Alex Pedersen, and I think it makes more sense when you compare it to Activity Monitor than when you compare it to every other menu bar utility.

Activity Monitor is what you open when something already feels off.

Your Mac is running hot. A fan spins up. Battery drops faster than expected. A browser tab goes wild. Then you go digging.

That’s a great tool for diagnosis.

A menu bar monitor has a different job. It’s there so you can catch the weirdness earlier, while you’re still in the middle of working.

That’s the appeal here.

Better Resource Monitor focuses on the stuff most people actually want at a glance:

CPU
memory
GPU
network

Not everything. Just the signals that help you notice when your machine is drifting into a bad state.

I also think the “always running” part matters more than people admit. If something lives in your menu bar all day, it should be lightweight, easy to trust, and easy to forget about until you need it.

According to the project’s public materials, Better Resource Monitor keeps that footprint pretty small:

around 15 MB memory use
under 0.1% CPU / energy impact
under 7 MB app size
support for Intel and Apple Silicon Macs on macOS Ventura 13+

It also takes a fairly restrained approach to permissions and setup, which is nice for software that’s meant to stay out of the way.

To be clear, this is not the app for everyone.

If you want deep historical graphs, lots of sensors, or a more complete control panel for your Mac, you’ll probably still lean toward tools like Stats or iStat Menus.

But if what you actually want is a quiet early-warning layer in the menu bar, Better Resource Monitor has a pretty clear point of view, and I think that makes it interesting.

Useful links:

Better Resource Monitor: https://better-resource-monitor.alexpedersen.dev/
Mac App Store: https://apps.apple.com/app/better-resource-monitor/id6758237306
GitHub: https://github.com/alexx855/better-resource-monitor

What a Mac menu bar monitor gives up to avoid root helpers and private APIs

xeliape — Sun, 26 Apr 2026 18:59:46 +0000

A lot of Mac monitoring discussion turns into a feature shootout.

Which app shows more sensors? Which one has better graphs? Which one can expose every possible system detail?

That is useful up to a point, but I think it misses a more interesting question: what happens when a menu bar monitor deliberately refuses the usual shortcuts?

Better Resource Monitor is a macOS app by Alex Pedersen, and the part that stood out to me was not the raw feature list. It was the constraint list.

According to the project docs, it avoids a few things that are pretty common in this category:

no root helper
no private APIs
sandboxed
offline by default
no dock icon

That is not just a trust or privacy story. It is also a product design story.

When you decide not to ship a root helper and not to lean on private APIs, you are accepting limits up front. You probably do not get the broadest possible system access. You probably cannot chase every obscure metric. You have to be more selective about what you show, how often you sample it, and how much overhead the app adds while doing its job.

That tends to push a utility in a specific direction: smaller scope, cleaner presentation, fewer moving parts, and more respect for the fact that this thing might sit in your menu bar every day for months.

That is what I find interesting here.

The app still covers the basics people actually check: CPU, memory, GPU, disk, and network activity. But the real question is whether it can do that while staying light, quiet, and boring in the best way.

Alex's public materials claim roughly 15 MB of memory use, under 0.1% CPU and energy impact, and an app size under 7 MB. If those numbers hold up in regular use, that feels like a sensible trade for an always-on utility.

It also helps explain who this is for, and who it is not for.

If you want a full diagnostics cockpit with deeper history, more sensors, and lots of tuning, you will probably still lean toward something like Stats or iStat Menus. Better Resource Monitor looks more opinionated than that. It seems built around the idea that a menu bar monitor should stay inside the lines, ask for less, and still be useful at a glance.

I like that tradeoff more than I expected to.

Links:

Better Resource Monitor: https://better-resource-monitor.alexpedersen.dev/
Mac App Store: https://apps.apple.com/app/better-resource-monitor/id6758237306
GitHub: https://github.com/alexx855/better-resource-monitor

Forem: xeliape

Activity Monitor helps you investigate. Better Resource Monitor helps you notice sooner.

What a Mac menu bar monitor gives up to avoid root helpers and private APIs