10 of the Best macOS and iOS Apps of 2019

2019 is coming to a close in just a few days, and we thought we'd share some of our favorite apps this year.

Over the course of the 2019, we've highlighted useful Mac and iOS apps primarily picked out by MacRumors readers in a YouTube series. For today's video, we've rounded up five iOS apps and five Mac apps that MacRumors readers found most useful from those videos.

Mac Apps

  • One Switch ($4.99) - One Switch is a Mac menu bar app that adds various switches to the Mac's menu bar. You can add toggles that will do things like hide desktop options, activate dark mode, keep the Mac awake, connect to headphones, toggle on Do Not Disturb, activate Night Shift, bring up the Screen Saver, and more. Options are customizable so you can make your One Switch menu do just want you need.
  • Stack (Free) - Stack is a Mac app that's sort of an internet launchpad for web apps, describing itself as an "internet OS." It houses all the websites you might want to keep tabs on like Facebook, Messenger, Gmail, Slack, and more, keeping them in one convenient place. You can organize your different apps into categories, and the app provides unified notifications so you don't miss anything.
  • Pock (Free) - Pock is a simple app that's designed to make your Touch Bar more useful by adding your dock to your Touch Bar so you can quickly access your apps and even files within folders. The Pock options are customizable, so you can choose what you need most, adding options like a now playing widget for controlling music, a status widget for getting info like WiFi connection of battery level, and more.
  • Moom ($9.99) - Moom is designed to let you quickly and easily move and resize windows on your Mac. It has preset sizes and locations, and also lets you draw grids to create custom window display sizes. There are also custom controls for moving, zooming, moving windows to a secondary display, centering, resizing and more, and window layouts can be saved.
  • Little Snitch ($45) - Little Snitch monitors all of the traffic on your Mac so you can see what apps are sending data, and where. It basically makes all of your Internet connections visible and gives you control over them, letting you approve or restrict what's being sent from your Mac. There's a world map so you can see where connections are being made, and there are modes for getting instant notifications or letting it run in the background.

iOS Apps

  • Spotify Stations (Free) - Spotify Stations is a standalone Spotify app that came out earlier this year. It's designed to let you create radio stations based on your favorite songs and artists, much like Pandora. Radio stations in Spotify aren't new, but Spotify Stations makes the feature a lot easier to use.
  • Microsoft Math Solver (Free) - For our readers still in school, we wanted to highlight Microsoft Math Solver, which is a super handy app that can help you with math problems. Microsoft Math Solver lets you write a math problem on screen or use the camera to snap a photo of a problem and it provides you with a step-by-step explanation on how to solve it. The app can also generate similar math problems so you can practice. It works with elementary math, pre-algebra, algebra, word problems, basic calculus, and statistics.
  • Halide ($5.99) - Halide is a camera app that offers up full manual controls for shutter speed, ISO, and white balance, along with a live histogram for perfecting exposure. The swipe-based interface is easy to use, and you can capture photos in RAW, JPG, TIFF, or HEIC formats. There are depth controls for newer iPhones, manual and autofocus tools, and for iPhone XR, there's a Depth Capture feature that works with pets, food, and other items, unlike the native Depth Control feature.
  • Unsplash (Free) - Unsplash is a community-based image sharing app that provides royalty-free photographs for you to use as wallpaper or for other purposes. It's not focused solely on wallpapers, but there's an interesting range of content and a huge number different options. There are featured categories along with a robust search tool for finding just what you're looking for. Along with an iOS app, Unsplash also has a website so you can get Mac wallpapers too.
  • What the Golf? (Free, but requires Apple Arcade) - ‌Apple Arcade‌, which offers tons of games for $4.99 per month, is a great deal, and we've come across quite a few games that make the subscription price worth it. One such game is What the Golf, a fun action game that takes golf to new places. What the Golf is described as the game for people who hate golf, so don't let the name fool you - this is a fun little game where the goal is to get an object (not always a golf ball) to a hole. There are fun puns, silly levels, ragdoll mechanics, and genuinely difficult content to contend with. It's the perfect game to pick up for a few minutes when waiting in line.

What were your favorite Mac and iOS apps in 2019? Let us know in the comments.

Popular Stories

iphone 17 models

No iPhone 18 Launch This Year, Reports Suggest

Thursday January 1, 2026 8:43 am PST by
Apple is not expected to release a standard iPhone 18 model this year, according to a growing number of reports that suggest the company is planning a significant change to its long-standing annual iPhone launch cycle. Despite the immense success of the iPhone 17 in 2025, the iPhone 18 is not expected to arrive until the spring of 2027, leaving the iPhone 17 in the lineup as the latest...
duolingo ad live activity

Duolingo Used iPhone's Dynamic Island to Display Ads, Violating Apple Design Guidelines

Friday January 2, 2026 1:36 pm PST by
Language learning app Duolingo has apparently been using the iPhone's Live Activity feature to display ads on the Lock Screen and the Dynamic Island, which violates Apple's design guidelines. According to multiple reports on Reddit, the Duolingo app has been displaying an ad for a "Super offer," which is Duolingo's paid subscription option. Apple's guidelines for Live Activity state that...
Clicks Communicator Feature

'Clicks Communicator' Unveiled — Will You Carry This With Your iPhone?

Friday January 2, 2026 6:35 am PST by
The company behind the BlackBerry-like Clicks Keyboard accessory for the iPhone today unveiled a new Android 16 smartphone called the Clicks Communicator. The purpose-built device is designed to be used as a second phone alongside your iPhone, with the intended focus being communication over content consumption. It runs a custom Android launcher that offers a curated selection of messaging...
Low Cost MacBook Feature A18 Pro

Low-Price 12.9-Inch MacBook With A18 Pro Chip Reportedly Launching Early This Year

Friday January 2, 2026 9:08 am PST by
Apple plans to introduce a 12.9-inch MacBook in spring 2026, according to TrendForce. In a press release this week, the Taiwanese research firm said this MacBook will be aimed at the entry-level to mid-range market, with "competitive pricing." TrendForce did not share any further details about this MacBook, but the information that it shared lines up with several rumors about a more...
Apple Fitness Plus hero

Apple Announces New Fitness+ Workout Programs, Strava Challenge, and More

Friday January 2, 2026 6:43 am PST by
Apple today announced a number of updates to Apple Fitness+ and activity with the Apple Watch. The key announcements include: New Year limited-edition award: Users can win the award by closing all three Activity Rings for seven days in a row in January. "Quit Quitting" Strava challenge: Available in Strava throughout January, users who log 12 workouts anytime in the month will win an ...
Low Cost A18 Pro MacBook Feature Pink

Apple's 2026 Low-Cost A18 Pro MacBook: What We Know So Far

Friday January 2, 2026 4:33 pm PST by
Apple is planning to release a low-cost MacBook in 2026, which will apparently compete with more affordable Chromebooks and Windows PCs. Apple's most affordable Mac right now is the $999 MacBook Air, and the upcoming low-cost MacBook is expected to be cheaper. Here's what we know about the low-cost MacBook so far. Size Rumors suggest the low-cost MacBook will have a display that's around 13 ...
Mac Pro Feature Blue

What's Happening With the Mac Pro?

Wednesday December 31, 2025 9:59 am PST by
Apple hasn't updated the Mac Pro since 2023, and according to recent rumors, there's no update coming in the near future. In fact, Apple might be finished with the Mac Pro. Bloomberg recently said that the Mac Pro is "on the back burner" and has been "largely written off" by Apple. Apple apparently views the more compact Mac Studio as the ideal high-end pro-level desktop, and it has almost...

Top Rated Comments

dantroline Avatar
79 months ago
Little Snitch ('https://www.obdev.at/products/littlesnitch/index.html'), a must have, I totally agree.

Carbon Copy Cloner ('https://bombich.com') is still a must have IMHO if you ever expect to rely on your backups. You can have a fully bootable backup drive so if your stuff gets destroyed you are up and going right away. Power users might want to look at Clonezilla ('https://clonezilla.org') for getting your Mac install image cloned to other machines (across an office, for example).

Cyberduck ('https://cyberduck.io') is a great FTP / SFTP transfer app (free).

Then the others: VLC for movies, KeePassX or MacPass for password storage, Brave Browser for better browsing, "Better Blocker" browser extension for Safari.

[S]If you have an Android device then Handshaker is pretty easy to use for transferring data to and fro.[/S] Not sure if Handshaker phones home(!)

I am currently looking for something better for Android file transfer, which is probably the good ol' Android File Transfer ('https://www.android.com/filetransfer/').

If you are handling/importing your old DVD library or CD's before they die of scratches, XLD ('https://sourceforge.net/projects/xld/') and Handbrake ('https://handbrake.fr') are really good. Thanks to them I have rescued some old and rare recordings.

The UnArchiver ('https://theunarchiver.com') is really good for opening compressed files from other OS's.

Currently I think Parallels marginally beats VMware Fusion for Windows emulation, but VMware has more relaxed licensing so it's hard to decide right now. Each iteration costs money, and you tend to need to fork out a new license fee when MacOS updates, so don't buy these unless you need them.

SoundFlower ('https://github.com/mattingalls/Soundflower') lets you redirect your audio output to a file which can be quite handy at times, Audacity is the best free editing tool for audio recordings. More advanced sound re-routing requires something like LoopBack ('https://rogueamoeba.com/loopback/').
Score: 6 Votes (Like | Disagree)
aroom Avatar
79 months ago
if you are looking for a free and open source alternatives for Little Snitch, you can use LuLu ('https://objective-see.com/products/lulu.html') and MenuMeter ('https://github.com/yujitach/MenuMeters/releases')

edit: Lulu will stop apps calling home and MenuMeter will provide a network stat (and more if you want), so as a combo it's a great alternative to Little Snitch. both are up to date and maintained.
Score: 5 Votes (Like | Disagree)
daveup2bat Avatar
79 months ago
If you use Plex, Filebot ('https://www.filebot.net') app is an absolute MUST have.
Score: 4 Votes (Like | Disagree)
Smigit Avatar
79 months ago
Better Touch Tool and Bartender are my two go to apps on Mac.
Score: 3 Votes (Like | Disagree)
deviant Avatar
79 months ago

Little Snitch, a must have, I totally agree.

Carbon Copy Cloner is still a must have IMHO if you ever expect to rely on your backups. You can have a fully bootable backup drive so if your stuff gets destroyed you are up and going right away. Power users might want to look at Clonezilla for getting your Mac install image cloned to other machines (across an office, for example).

Cyberduck is a great FTP / SFTP transfer app (free).

Then the others: VLC for movies, KeePassX or MacPass for password storage, Brave Browser for better browsing, "Better Blocker" browser extension for Safari.

If you have an Android device then Handshaker is pretty easy to use for transferring data to and fro.

If you are handling/importing your old DVD library or CD's before they die of scratches, XLD and Handbrake are really good. Thanks to them I have rescued some old and rare recordings.

The UnArchiver is really good for opening compressed files from other OS's.

Currently I think Parallels marginally beats VMware Fusion for Windows emulation, but VMware has more relaxed licensing so it's hard to decide right now. Each iteration costs money, and you tend to need to fork out a new license fee when MacOS updates, so don't buy these unless you need them.

SoundFlower lets you redirect your audio output to a file which can be quite handy at times, Audacity is the best free editing tool for audio recordings.
for movies, there’s new sheriff in town. IINA.
Score: 3 Votes (Like | Disagree)
jkleroy Avatar
79 months ago
Not released in 2019 but Packr ('https://packr.app') for iOS is a must have for all frequent travelers.
Score: 3 Votes (Like | Disagree)