Chippytea

A native Mac app for making space and earning your tea. SwiftUI + Rust.

Free · Open sourceLatest versionMac

About Chippytea

Free up space on your Mac.

chippytea is an ultra-performant, native macOS app that clears space on your Mac. Built with SwiftUI and Rust, it helps you find app caches, developer tools, old build folders and downloads you may no longer need. Review their estimated sizes, see what removing them means, and choose what to keep or remove. SwiftUI + Rust · macOS 14+ · Free and open source

Build it · How it works · Contribute · Security

An illustrated cleanup, not a live scan. Animation respects reduced motion.

chippytea runs locally from your menu bar. No account, no telemetry, no automatic deletion.

How it works

  • Find cleanup opportunities. Scan folders you choose, or use Scan my Mac for app and developer caches, logs, Xcode data, Python bytecode, build folders, downloads and large personal files. It also checks known system and tool-managed storage locations automatically.
  • Check before you clean. Review the files, estimated size, and consequences. Git and activity checks vary by category; personal files and caches without an identified owning app still need your judgment.
  • Choose what to remove. Move files to Trash, or permanently remove eligible developer caches, build files and dependencies. Review the outcome and any credited space in the cleanup history.

Check duplicate files compares already-indexed old/large personal-file suggestions when you ask. It verifies contents, lets you choose one copy to keep and one to review, and rechecks both before moving the selected copy to Trash. This is a bounded check, not a whole-Mac duplicate search; ordinary scans never hash personal-file contents.

Moving files to Trash does not free storage. App caches, logs, Python bytecode, Xcode DerivedData, downloads and personal files are review/Trash-only; they never earn chips. Verified developer caches, build files and dependencies can be deleted permanently after their ownership, activity and contents are rechecked.

Known npm, npx, Corepack, Bun, pip, uv, mise, Cargo, SwiftPM, Zig, Expo, Homebrew download and AWS CLI caches appear in the same cleanup list, with the same checkboxes and review action. Only recognized cache directories are eligible; active tools, shared files and unrelated configuration stay protected. Blocked caches stay in the list with their reason and cleanup disabled. Installed toolchains, container data and system locations appear alongside cleanup findings with their relevant review steps. Their measured size does not establish how much is removable; some system locations need administrator access.

Description adapted from the project README.

Version
0.1.4
Updated
Sep 4, 2026
Size
8.8 MB

Open source details

Released
Sep 4, 2026
GitHub stars
234

Community project. Help and bug reports go to the maintainers on GitHub; AppsXi does not provide support for this app.

License

Permissive

MIT License

Use, change and share it freely, including in closed source apps, as long as the copyright notice stays.

Read the full license

How this app was checked

AppsXi checks every version before it is listed.

  • Signed by Richard McIlroy (47B7FCLL43)

    Apple Developer ID team 47B7FCLL43

  • Notarized by Apple

  • Extra macOS protections on (Hardened Runtime)

  • File matches the fingerprint GitHub published

    Show the SHA-256

    71ad86c93a7858ad34c15301ee1d12b4f253470f7adacc93bdf90bd333c73061

  • No malware found

    ClamAV 1.5.4 on Oct 20, 2026

  • Updates itself from the maintainer's own feed

    sparkle: https://github.com/richiemcilroy/chippytea/releases/latest/download/appcast.xml. AppsXi checks each new version too.

Not included yet: installing and watching the app run in a virtual machine.

What these checks do and don't cover

Versions

0.1.4

Checked Oct 20, 2026 · Mac

DMG · 8.8 MB

Checked

Questions about Chippytea

Is Chippytea free?

Yes. Chippytea is free and open source under the MIT License. AppsXi lists the maintainers' official release and does not charge for it.

Is Chippytea safe to download?

AppsXi downloads every version of Chippytea from the maintainers' official GitHub release and checks it before it is listed. For version 0.1.4 (checked Oct 20, 2026), the Mac download is signed by its developer and notarized by Apple, each file matches the checksum GitHub publishes for the release, byte for byte and a malware scan found nothing.

Does Chippytea run on Apple silicon Macs?

Yes. Chippytea has a native Apple silicon build, and it runs on Intel Macs too.

What does Chippytea need to run?

Chippytea needs macOS Sonoma (14) or later.

Who makes Chippytea?

Chippytea is an open source project by Richie McIlroy on GitHub (richiemcilroy/chippytea). Help and bug reports go to its maintainers there.

Reviews

No reviews yet. Anyone who downloads it from AppsXi while signed in can review it a day later.

Something wrong with this app? Report a problem. Maintainer? Ask us to change or remove this listing.

Maintain Chippytea? Add the AppsXi badge to your README
Chippytea on AppsXi
Markdown
[![Chippytea on AppsXi](https://appsxi.com/apps/chippytea/badge.svg)](https://appsxi.com/apps/chippytea)

It shows when Chippytea is in a top 10 and says “Verified on AppsXi” otherwise.