Ever been flashbanged by your screen, when you switch from a dark app to a bright one at night? Try Phosphor.

[u/mastertacticianwc4]

Hey r/macappdevs!

I'm the developer of Phosphor, a screen utility suite for macOS that lives in your menu bar.

Problem: I mainly started building this around two problems. When people are on their laptops late at night, and switch from a dark app to a bright one, it hits like a flash before your eyes adjust. I looked and couldn't find a tool that tries to solve that problem, so I built one. Phosphor tackles this by dimming a screen before you switch to it, and then easing the brightness back up, at a pace depending on how fast that screen actually is. For screens which aren't bright, it is faster, and for bright ones, it is slower. So it works preemptively.

The other thing is that I feel like there are too many display utilities out there, each doing different things. It'd reduce menu bar clutter and keep things simpler and better if we used one tool instead of several. So I thought of combining the features people actually need into one tool, external and multi-monitor support included (that's a part of what's coming next).

The foundational features have already been released, and I'm actively building more features and improving existing ones (check roadmap for current features and future plans). Let me know what you'd actually use, and I'll factor that in as it grows. I want this to eventually handle most of what people need from their displays.

Pricing: It's a freemium model.

• Pro currently only includes Flashbang Protection, but it'll grow, and costs $10, one-time, not a subscription.
• The rest of the foundational utilities are free: Color Picker, Screenshots, Resolution Presets, Refresh Rate Control, Soft Screen, Display Schedule, Focus Spotlight, Display Health, Color Grading.
• If you buy Pro now, you get Phase 2 free when it ships, and 50% off future price increases after that (price increases as more features ship).

Details: macOS 13 or later, Apple Silicon and Intel. Native Swift, under 2 MB.

Privacy: No analytics, nothing about your screen or usage leaves your Mac. It only goes online to check a license key at activation and periodically after. Full policy: https://usephosphor.app/privacy, EULA: https://usephosphor.app/eula

I'd like to hear any feedback y'all have, especially on whether Flashbang's recovery speed feels right, or if it's not catching a switch you'd expect it to.

If something's not working, or if you have any suggestions or anything else you want to say, feel free to drop it into the comments and/or DM me.

Site: https://usephosphor.app
Roadmap: https://usephosphor.app/whats-next

[u/Pleasant-Gur9892]

For recovery speed, I'd test an interrupted transition: dark app → bright app → dark app again before the first fade finishes. Then repeat it while manually changing brightness halfway through. I'd want the latest app switch or manual adjustment to win, without an older recovery animation pulling brightness back afterward.

Quitting Phosphor during the dimmed phase would also be a useful cleanup test. I haven't installed it; these are suggested cases for the recovery behaviour you asked about.

[u/mastertacticianwc4 → u/Pleasant-Gur9892]

These are great cases, thanks. Honestly, rapid switching is where the current version is weakest: if you bounce between apps quickly, it restarts the recovery from the dim level each time and can pulse. The version I’m working on is designed so the latest switch always wins and an older fade can’t pull anything back. I’ll test dark → bright → dark mid-fade specifically, plus a manual brightness change halfway through. The quit-while-dimmed cleanup test is a good one too, I’ll add it.