MagSleep

A tiny macOS menu bar app that turns off your MagSafe LED when the MacBook sleeps, and hands it back to macOS when it wakes. Or to turn it off completely.

Perfect for a dark bedroom: no green/amber glow from the charger while you sleep.

Features

• Sleep Mode — turns the MagSafe LED off while the Mac sleeps, restores it to macOS on wake (also turns it off when just the display sleeps)
• Always Off — keeps the LED off at all times (re-asserted even when you plug/unplug the charger)
• Disabled — hands the LED back to macOS entirely, whenever you want
• Night Schedule — keeps the LED off from sunset to sunrise (optional, sun times come from macOS)
• Launch at Login — starts MagSleep automatically when you log in
• In-app updates — checks for new versions automatically (twice a day) and installs them with Sparkle; no more manual DMG downloads
• VirusTotal-scanned — every release DMG is uploaded to VirusTotal before publishing; the badge above links to the current scan result
• Lives quietly in the menu bar; the helper keeps working even if you quit the app

Requirements

• Apple Silicon MacBook with MagSafe 3 (2021 or later MacBook Pro / Air)
• A MagSafe cable with an LED
• macOS 14 Sonoma or later
• Admin password once (to install the privileged helper)

Intel Macs are not supported.

How to install

From a DMG

1. Download the latest MagSleep DMG from the Releases page.
2. Open the DMG and drag MagSleep into Applications.
3. Launch MagSleep (it will appear as an icon in the menu bar).
4. Click the menu bar icon and choose Sleep Mode (or Always Off) — this installs the helper and asks for your admin password once.

Important

MagSleep is ad-hoc signed, not notarized (notarization requires a paid Apple Developer Program membership). macOS therefore quarantines the downloaded app, and Gatekeeper may block the first launch. This is expected — unblock it with one of the methods below.

If Gatekeeper blocks the app or the DMG

When you first try to open a downloaded MagSleep, macOS may show one of these dialogs:

• "MagSleep cannot be opened because the developer cannot be verified."
• "MagSleep cannot be opened because it is not from an identified developer."
• "MagSleep-1.0.X.dmg cannot be opened because it was not downloaded from the App Store."

Try these in order — stop as soon as one works:

Method A — right-click → Open (easiest)

1. Open Finder and go to Applications.
2. Right-click (or Control-click) MagSleep, then choose Open.
3. Click Open in the confirmation dialog.
4. MagSleep launches and is allowed to open from then on.

Method B — System Settings → Open Anyway

1. After a first blocked attempt, open System Settings → Privacy & Security.
2. Scroll down to the Security section.
3. Next to "MagSleep was blocked from use…" click Open Anyway and confirm with Touch ID or your password.

Method C — the DMG itself won't open If the error happens while opening the DMG, unblock the DMG file first, then open it again:

xattr -d com.apple.quarantine ~/Downloads/MagSleep-1.3.3.dmg

Method D — remove the quarantine flag (most reliable) If the app was already copied into Applications, remove the quarantine flag directly:

xattr -dr com.apple.quarantine /Applications/MagSleep.app

Then launch MagSleep normally. To confirm it's unblocked:

xattr -l /Applications/MagSleep.app | grep quarantine

No output means the flag is gone and Gatekeeper will no longer block it.

Note

• Removing the quarantine flag is safe: MagSleep is open source and built locally from this repository.
• Gatekeeper exceptions work best when the app lives in /Applications. If it still won't open, move it there and retry Method A or B.

How to use

1. Click the menu bar icon and choose a mode:
   • Sleep Mode — LED off while the Mac sleeps, restored to macOS on wake (recommended)
   • Always Off — LED stays off at all times
   • Disabled — hand the LED back to macOS entirely
2. The first mode selection installs the small root helper and asks for your admin password once.
3. Optionally enable Launch at Login so MagSleep starts automatically.

That's it. Sleep and wake are handled automatically — the helper keeps running even if you quit the menu bar app, as long as it stays enabled.

Menu reference

Item	Action
Sleep Mode	LED off while the Mac sleeps, restored to macOS on wake
Always Off	LED stays off at all times (re-asserted even after plug-in/unplug)
Disabled	Hand the LED back to macOS entirely
Launch at Login	Start MagSleep when you log in
Check for Updates…	Check for updates via Sparkle (also checked automatically twice a day)
Report a Problem…	Open the GitHub issue tracker with your app version + helper revision pre-filled
Buy me a coffee	ko-fi.com/realabitbol
Uninstall MagSleep…	Full cleanup, then quit
About MagSleep…	App version and helper status
Quit MagSleep	Quit the menu bar UI (the helper keeps running if enabled)

Automation

MagSleep is scriptable from AppleScript — it goes through the same socket requests as the menu items, so no helper reinstall is involved. (Shortcuts/App Intents were removed in v1.2.6: the SwiftPM build path can't emit the AppIntents metadata the Shortcuts app requires.)

AppleScript (e.g. in Script Editor):

tell application "MagSleep"
    set led mode "alwaysOff"   -- "sleep" | "alwaysOff" | "disabled"
    turn LED off
    turn LED on
    get led status
end tell

How to update

• Automatic: MagSleep checks for new versions twice a day and offers the update when one is available.
• Manual: click Check for Updates… in the menu bar to check right now.
• Updates are downloaded and installed in-place by Sparkle (no DMG, no need to reinstall), then the app relaunches.
• If you ever reinstall from a fresh DMG instead, macOS may block it again — see the Gatekeeper guide in How to install above.

How to uninstall

From the app: Uninstall MagSleep… → confirm → admin password.

That restores macOS LED control, unloads and deletes the helper and LaunchDaemon, turns off Launch at Login, and quits. Delete MagSleep.app afterwards if you want.

From the terminal:

sudo launchctl bootout system/com.magsleep.helper 2>/dev/null || true
sudo /Library/PrivilegedHelperTools/com.magsleep.helper --reset 2>/dev/null || true
sudo rm -f /Library/PrivilegedHelperTools/com.magsleep.helper
sudo rm -f /Library/LaunchDaemons/com.magsleep.helper.plist
sudo rm -rf /Library/Preferences/MagSleep
sudo rm -rf /Library/Logs/MagSleep
sudo rm -rf /tmp/magsleep

Support ☕

If MagSleep keeps your nights a little darker, you can buy me a coffee.

---

For developers

Building from source

git clone <repo-url>
cd MagSleep
make app VERSION=1.3.3    # build dist/MagSleep.app
make install VERSION=1.3.3  # copy to /Applications
# or
make dmg VERSION=1.3.3    # dist/MagSleep-1.3.3.dmg

Build targets

Command	Result
make app VERSION=x.y.z	Build dist/MagSleep.app with that version
make dmg VERSION=x.y.z	dist/MagSleep-<version>.dmg
make install VERSION=x.y.z	Copy the built app to /Applications (never silently rebuilds)
make run	Build and open
make test	Run the XCTest unit tests
make lint	Run SwiftLint + Periphery dead-code scan (also runs in the git pre-commit hook)
make install-hooks	Install the git pre-commit hook (SwiftLint, Periphery, tests, warnings-as-errors build); requires swiftlint and periphery (brew install swiftlint periphery)
make notarize	Sign + notarize with a Developer ID cert if present (skips gracefully without one)
make release VERSION=x.y.z	CI-only release driver: validate changelog, bump version refs, commit, tag vx.y.z, push — CI builds + publishes (no local build)
make clean	Remove .build and dist

The app version is written to the app's Info.plist; the helper revision (last commit touching helper-affecting code) is written to the helper version file on install. Launching an app whose helper revision differs from the installed helper's triggers an "Update Helper" prompt — so an unchanged helper is not reinstalled on a plain app update.

Release process

Releases are CI-only. Every published DMG is built from scratch on a GitHub Actions runner — never on a maintainer's machine — so a published DMG is provably GitHub-built. To release:

1. Write the released version's ## [x.y.z] section in CHANGELOG.md.
2. make release VERSION=x.y.z — validates the changelog section, bumps the README/Makefile version references, commits Release vx.y.z, creates the tag, and pushes branch + tag. That's all that happens locally.
3. The .github/workflows/release.yml workflow (triggered by the tag push) runs tests, builds the DMG + Sparkle ZIP from scratch, VirusTotal-scans the DMG, signs appcast/appcast.xml with the Sparkle EdDSA key, attests the DMG + ZIP (Sigstore provenance — verify with gh attestation verify MagSleep-x.y.z.dmg --owner realAbitbol), publishes the GitHub Release, and commits the signed appcast.

The workflow needs two repo secrets (gh secret set): VIRUSTOTAL_API_KEY (VirusTotal scan) and SPARKLE_EDDSA_KEY (the 44-char base64 Sparkle EdDSA private key, from the login keychain under service https://sparkle-project.org).

Notarization & distribution

MagSleep is ad-hoc signed, not notarized: notarization requires an Apple Developer Program membership (paid, $99/yr) and a Developer ID certificate. Because of this, DMGs downloaded from the internet may be blocked by Gatekeeper — prefer building from source (make app + make install), which produces a locally-built app with no quarantine flag.

If you ever join the Apple Developer Program, make notarize signs with your Developer ID certificate, submits for notarization, and staples the ticket. Without a certificate it prints guidance and exits 0.

How it works

Mac goes to sleep  →  helper writes ACLC = 1  →  MagSafe LED off
Mac wakes up       →  helper writes ACLC = 0  →  macOS controls the LED again

MagSleep is a lightweight AppKit menu bar app plus a privileged LaunchDaemon. The daemon is fully event-driven: it serves app requests over a unix socket (/var/run/magsleep.sock, request/ack, no polling), listens for system power events (IORegisterForSystemPower), and reacts to power-source changes (IOPS) so Always Off stays off even when you plug in or unplug the charger. It writes the MagSafe LED SMC key ACLC; root is required for SMC writes, which is why the first mode selection asks for your password once.

ACLC	Meaning
0	System control (amber / green as usual)
1	Off
3	Green
4	Amber

MagSafe LED control is undocumented. A macOS or firmware update may change or break it.

Tests

make test runs Tests/MagSleepCoreTests (XCTest): request → config transitions, config decode/fallback, LED target logic, SMC struct layout, constants/paths, socket protocol round-trips, and version comparison.