What is focusmic?

FocusMic is a small open source macOS utility that lives in the menu bar and locks which microphone and speaker or headphone device your Mac treats as the default. Many people run into a common annoyance where plugging in a Bluetooth headset, a USB audio interface, or opening another app silently switches the system's default input or output device. FocusMic watches for that and switches it back automatically to the device you actually chose. To use it, a person opens FocusMic from the menu bar, picks the input and output devices they want to keep, and turns on a guard switch for each one. If the chosen device disconnects, FocusMic waits and restores it as the default again once it reconnects. Extra features include an optional volume lock for the chosen input device, a live input level meter that shows how loud the microphone currently is, detailed information about each device such as transport type, sample rate, and channel count, and a recent activity log. It also supports launching automatically at login and can update itself through Sparkle for direct downloads, while App Store copies update through the App Store. On privacy, the README states plainly that FocusMic runs entirely on the local machine, does not record, upload, or analyze audio, has no account system, analytics, ads, or crash reporting, and stores its settings locally. The only network use in the GitHub and Homebrew builds is checking for app updates. FocusMic requires macOS 15.0 or later and can be installed from GitHub Releases or through Homebrew. Building it from source requires Xcode 16 and uses SwiftUI and Core Audio. The project is released under the MIT license.