Switching from Windows to Mac: the utilities you lose
Most switcher guides cover where the Control key went. This one is about the second week, when you reach for a utility you have used for years and discover it does not exist here. For each: what it did, whether macOS has anything built in, and the closest thing to install.
The pattern. Windows power users build a toolkit; macOS ships more in the box but has gaps in different places. Most gaps have a good free answer. Two — window tabs and a system-wide scripting language — have no built-in answer at all.
| On Windows | Built into macOS? | Closest replacement |
|---|---|---|
| Groupy (tabbed window groups) | No — tabs only within one app | Tack |
| PowerToys FancyZones | Partly — half/quarter tiling | Rectangle, Magnet, Raycast |
| AutoHotkey | No | Hammerspoon, Keyboard Maestro |
| Everything (instant file search) | Spotlight, mostly | Spotlight, Alfred, Raycast |
| ShareX / Snipping Tool | Yes — ⇧⌘5 | CleanShot X, Shottr |
| Alt+Tab per window | No — ⌘Tab is per app | AltTab |
| Clipboard history (Win+V) | No | Maccy, Raycast, Paste |
| 7-Zip | Zip only | Keka, The Unarchiver |
| Notepad++ | TextEdit | BBEdit, CotEditor, VS Code |
Groupy: tabbed window groups
Groupy lets you drag any two windows together and get one window with tabs — a browser next to a terminal next to a spreadsheet. Once you have worked that way, a desktop without it feels like a desk where nothing stacks.
macOS looks like it has this and does not. Window › Merge All Windows makes tabs, but only from windows of the same app, and only in apps whose developers opted in — the menu item is simply missing in most third-party software. Stage Manager groups windows into sets but leaves each in its own frame. Nothing built in puts two apps in one tabbed window. The full comparison →
Tack is the direct replacement: drag a window onto another, hold half a second, release, and they share a frame with a tab strip above. Any apps, mixed freely; click a tab to switch, drag one out to detach. The ⌃Tab and ⌘1–⌘9 shortcuts are in Settings, off by default. It is the same gesture Groupy taught you — and Groupy's grouping rules made the trip too: rules auto-group an app's new windows, exclude an app, or keep named apps together in one group under a shared label.
PowerToys FancyZones: custom tiling layouts
Since Sequoia, macOS tiles windows to halves and quarters when you drag them to a screen edge or hold ⌥ over the green button. That covers the two-window case. What it lacks is FancyZones' custom grids and keyboard-driven placement.
Rectangle (free) adds keyboard shortcuts for thirds, sixths and corners. Magnet is the App Store equivalent. Raycast bundles the same commands into its launcher. For true custom zones, Rectangle Pro or Moom.
AutoHotkey: system-wide scripting
This is the gap that hurts the most, and there is no clean answer. Hammerspoon (free) is the closest in spirit — Lua scripts with hooks into windows, keys, Wi-Fi, USB and more — and it can do almost everything AutoHotkey can, but expect to write more code. Keyboard Maestro (paid) is the graphical option and covers the common cases without scripting. Karabiner-Elements handles key remapping specifically and does it better than either. Text expansion, which many AutoHotkey scripts exist for, is built into macOS under System Settings › Keyboard › Text Replacements.
Everything: instant file search
Everything indexes NTFS in seconds and finds any filename as you type. Spotlight (⌘Space) does the same job and indexes contents too, so for most people this one is simply built in. Where it falls short is exact-filename search across a huge tree, and boolean queries; Alfred and Raycast add file-search modes with better filtering. In Finder, ⌘F then Name gives you Everything's literal behaviour.
ShareX and Snipping Tool: screenshots
Good news here: ⇧⌘5 opens a capture toolbar with region, window, full screen and screen recording, and ⇧⌘4 then Space captures a single window with its shadow. That is most of ShareX. What is missing is annotation, scrolling capture and upload workflows; CleanShot X (paid) and Shottr (free) add those.
Alt+Tab: switching between windows
⌘Tab switches between applications, and every window of that app comes forward together. ⌘` cycles windows within the current app. Two keys for what Windows does with one, and no thumbnails. AltTab (free, open source) restores Windows-style behaviour with a per-window switcher and previews. Grouping related windows into a tab group also shrinks the problem: three windows that share one frame are one thing to switch to, not three.
Clipboard history
Win+V has no counterpart; the Mac clipboard holds one item. Maccy (free) adds a searchable history, Raycast includes one, Paste is the polished paid option.
The small ones
- 7-Zip — macOS unzips and zips natively; Keka or The Unarchiver for 7z, rar and everything else.
- Notepad++ — TextEdit is a rich text editor by default; ⇧⌘T switches a document to plain text. CotEditor (free) or BBEdit are the real replacements.
- Task Manager — Activity Monitor, in Utilities. ⌥⌘Esc is the force-quit dialog.
- Windows Terminal — Terminal is fine; iTerm2 or Ghostty for split panes and profiles.
- Windows key + arrows — nothing by default; Rectangle's shortcuts fill the gap.
Common questions
Is there a Groupy for Mac?
Stardock does not make one, and macOS's native tabs work only within a single app. Tack is a native Mac utility that does the same job: drag any windows together and they become a tabbed group.
What replaces PowerToys?
No single bundle. FancyZones → Rectangle or Raycast; PowerToys Run → Spotlight, Raycast or Alfred; Keyboard Manager → Karabiner-Elements; Color Picker → Digital Color Meter, which ships with macOS.
What is the Mac equivalent of AutoHotkey?
Hammerspoon for scripting, Keyboard Maestro for a graphical version, Karabiner-Elements for key remapping. Nothing matches AutoHotkey's one-file ubiquity.
Does Alt+Tab work the same?
No — ⌘Tab is per application and ⌘` is per window within the app. The free AltTab utility restores per-window switching with thumbnails.