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Ledge: a tiny shelf for your files, right in your Mac's menu bar

· 2 min read · By Nilutpal Pathak

  • Ledge
  • macOS
  • Launch

You're dragging a file, but the place you want to drop it is in another app, another Space, or a folder you can't reach yet. So you let go, hunt for the file again, and start over.

I got tired of that, so I built Ledge: a free, open-source macOS menu-bar app that holds your files on a temporary shelf while you move around.

How it works

  1. Start dragging a file, image, link, or piece of text in any app.
  2. Shake your mouse left and right. A small shelf appears under your pointer.
  3. Drop the item onto the shelf and go wherever you need to.
  4. Drag it back out into any app, whenever you're ready.

A shelf can hold files, folders, images, web links, and text. Ledge never moves or copies your originals until you drag them out.

More than a shelf

A built-in image converter. Ledge turns HEIC, JPG, PNG, GIF, TIFF, PSD, AVIF, and more into WebP, and turns WebP back into PNG, JPEG, or GIF. Batches can be any size, folders included. You get quality and lossless controls, resizing, a before/after preview with file sizes, watermarks, and renaming. EXIF and GPS data are stripped by default. For a one-click version, use Quick Convert to WebP from the shelf menu.

Handy actions. Share through AirDrop or Mail, zip files, rename in bulk with a live preview, copy a public iCloud Drive link, or add your own custom actions.

Fast shortcuts. ⌃⌥Space opens a new shelf. ⌃⌥V opens one from your clipboard. You can also dock a shelf to a screen edge so it slides out when you need it.

Small and private

  • About 3 MB on disk, about 20 MB of memory, and 0% CPU when idle
  • Native Swift and AppKit
  • No account, no ads, no subscription
  • Everything runs on your Mac. Nothing is uploaded. The only network feature is the optional iCloud Drive link.
  • Open source under Apache 2.0

If you've used Dropover or Yoink, Ledge will feel familiar. It's a free alternative, and it adds the image converter.

Get it

Requires macOS 13 or later on Apple silicon. Intel Macs can build from source.

brew install --cask NeeL21YT/ledge/ledge

Ledge isn't notarized yet, so on first launch you may need to choose Open Anyway in System Settings → Privacy & Security. The Homebrew cask handles that for you.

Why I made it

Ledge is a solo project from GaLaXantic Studios. It's free and will stay free. If it saves you a few annoying drags a day and you'd like to support it, you can buy me a coffee on Ko-fi. Feedback and bug reports are welcome on GitHub.

Thanks for reading, and happy dragging.

— Nilutpal (NeeL)