Show HN: Rift – A tiling window manager for macOS • Hacker News Board

rift is essentially aerospace but implemented in a yabai style. yabai style meaning using low level, private apis and generally focusing more on performance. whereas aerospace prides itself on only using one private api.

usage wise, aerospace and rift both use a virtual workspace system where all of your (work)spaces are in one macos space so no red tape has to be cut in order to move windows from ws -> ws and so forth

Re: Show HN: Rift – A tiling window manager for macOS

#5

Post by fiddlerwoaroof » Sun, Oct 12, 2025, 1:57 AM UTC

I used to be a big user of tiling window managers but, more recently, I’ve discovered that the workflow of something like Moom is nicer in more situations.

Re: Show HN: Rift – A tiling window manager for macOS

#6

Post by 0x6c6f6c » Sun, Oct 12, 2025, 2:05 AM UTC

tra3 wrote: post #3

this is cool, I love multiple options on macOS. What’s the difference between this and yabai or aerospace?

Same boat, but vs amethyst. It's worked very well for me the last few years.

Re: Show HN: Rift – A tiling window manager for macOS

#7

Post by mgrandl » Sun, Oct 12, 2025, 2:17 AM UTC

atticus_ wrote: post #4

tra3 wrote: post #3

this is cool, I love multiple options on macOS. What’s the difference between this and yabai or aerospace?

yabai uses native macos spaces and generally requires sip to be disabled to have a good experience(windows can't be moved between spaces without) rift is essentially aerospace but implemented in a yabai style. yabai style meaning using low level, private apis and generally focusing more on performance. whereas aerospace prides itself on only using one private api. usage wise, aerospace and rift both use a virtual wor…

Does rift handle native MacOS tabs like the ones ghostty and finder use? I might give it a shot. I have been having a couple of issues with Aerospace lately.

Re: Show HN: Rift – A tiling window manager for macOS

#8

Post by mgrandl » Sun, Oct 12, 2025, 2:27 AM UTC

atticus_ wrote: post #4

tra3 wrote: post #3

this is cool, I love multiple options on macOS. What’s the difference between this and yabai or aerospace?

yabai uses native macos spaces and generally requires sip to be disabled to have a good experience(windows can't be moved between spaces without) rift is essentially aerospace but implemented in a yabai style. yabai style meaning using low level, private apis and generally focusing more on performance. whereas aerospace prides itself on only using one private api. usage wise, aerospace and rift both use a virtual wor…

Also I am wondering if you could estimate how difficult it would be to implement something like Niri? I much prefer the scrolling style tiling, but none of the MacOS WMs seem to be going that route (other than PaperWM.spoon which is not for me).

Re: Show HN: Rift – A tiling window manager for macOS

#9

Post by cloudking » Sun, Oct 12, 2025, 2:58 AM UTC

Pretty cool, but nothing beats Swish if you're using a Macbook trackpad https://highlyopinionated.co/swish/

Re: Show HN: Rift – A tiling window manager for macOS

#10

Post by paularmstrong » Sun, Oct 12, 2025, 2:58 AM UTC

fiddlerwoaroof wrote: post #5

I used to be a big user of tiling window managers but, more recently, I’ve discovered that the workflow of something like Moom is nicer in more situations.

Moom is an absolute crucial piece of software that I've gladly paid for upgrades to over time to support it.

There's also BetterSnapTool, which I used to use, but I think switched to Moom for specific features at one point in time. It's even cheaper and still receiving updates to continue working.