Guides/Vitals vs iStat Menus
Vitals vs iStat Menus
Quick answer
Vitals and iStat Menus do different jobs. iStat Menus puts figures in the menu bar, more of them than anything else, with alert rules and fan control. Vitals puts its own readouts in the menu bar and adds the window behind them: every app with its helper processes counted in, up to a year of history per app, and a notification when one misbehaves. Choose iStat Menus for the menu bar alone; choose Vitals to know which app is behind the figure.
VitalsiStat Menus Choose Vitals if
- You want to know which app is using memory, CPU or battery, helpers included
- You want to look back as far as a year, not just the last few minutes
- You run dev servers and lose track of what is holding a port
- You want a full Activity Monitor replacement, with the menu bar as well
Choose iStat Menus if
- You want weather or a clock in the menu bar
- You want alert rules on any figure you choose
- You are on a macOS older than 15
Where Vitals pulls ahead
A window, not only a dropdown
iStat Menus tops out at the top apps in each dropdown. Vitals opens a full window that lists every app, one row each with its helper processes folded in, so "which app is using my memory?" is one line, not a hunt.
Up to a year, for every app
iStat Menus keeps graphs in its dropdowns and its site does not say how far back they go. Vitals keeps every app's history for up to a year, so what drained the battery this afternoon still has an answer tomorrow.
Alerts about apps, not thresholds
iStat Menus alerts when a figure crosses a line you set. Vitals watches how each app behaves and names the one that kept the CPU busy or kept growing in memory, with no rules to write.
See it for yourself
The same Mac, listed the way Activity Monitor lists it and the way Vitals does. Tap Vitals to watch about 900 processes become eight apps.
Everything Vitals does
One app, one payment, every update for life.
- Processes grouped by app. Every helper process is added to the app that launched it, so a working Mac shows about 60 apps instead of about 1,000 processes, each with one figure for memory, CPU, energy, disk and network.
- A tab per subsystem. Overview, CPU, Memory, Disk, Network, GPU, Neural Engine, Battery, Sound, Bluetooth and Projects, plus Containers while Docker runs, each with its live figures and the apps behind them.
- Your coding agents, and what is left of your plans. An Agents tab with every running coding agent, Claude Code, Codex, Gemini CLI and the rest: its project, what it is doing right now, and everything it started, with Quit for the session and all of it together. For Claude, Codex, GitHub Copilot, Cursor, Antigravity, Grok, Ollama and OpenCode, how much of each plan is left, when it resets and whether you are on pace, for every account signed in on the Mac, and the tokens Claude Code and Codex used today and this week.
- An MCP server for Claude, Codex and Cursor. Claude, Claude Code, Codex, Cursor and any assistant that speaks MCP can ask what is running, which app is behind a number, what is on a port, and what the last 30 days looked like. It cannot quit anything by itself: Vitals asks you first. Off until you turn it on.
- A Neural Engine tab. How hard the Neural Engine is working, which apps are using it, and a chart of the last minutes, in the window, the menu bar and on the Overview. On Macs with Apple silicon.
- Inside your browser. Click Chrome, Safari, Firefox, Edge, Brave, Arc or Dia to see its memory and CPU split into tabs, extensions, graphics and the browser itself. Slack, VS Code and similar apps are split by window.
- Up to a year of history. CPU, memory, energy, disk and network from the last hour to the last year, with the apps that used the most, ranked hour by hour for the last two days. Keep 30 days, 90 days, 6 months or a year.
- What keeps the Mac awake, and the fans on. The Battery tab lists the apps holding sleep off, what each said it is doing and for how long. When the Mac runs hot, Vitals names the apps behind it, with Quit beside each.
- Alerts for misbehaving apps. A notification when an app keeps the CPU busy, keeps growing in memory, or hammers the disk or network.
- Dev servers and open ports, by project. Processes grouped by the project folder they run in, with their listening ports, and dev servers left idle for days pointed out and offered to stop.
- A menu bar you arrange. Every readout can be its own menu bar item: CPU, memory, GPU, network, disk, temperature or battery, as a value, a graph or both, ⌘-dragged into any order. Behind it, a dropdown with every metric, the busiest apps, and a tab for each metric.
- Make it yours. Vitals’ own colors, Monochrome, or a set made for color blindness. The numbers in Rounded, San Francisco, SF Mono, New York or any font on the Mac, light to bold. Comfortable or compact spacing, charts of the last 5, 15 or 30 minutes, light or dark, and exported pictures in the same look.
- Arrange the window and the dropdown. Choose the window’s tabs and their order, and show, hide or reorder the sections, cards and lists on every tab. The dropdown has its own tiles and a List layout with one line per metric. Reset puts everything back.
- Docker containers. A Containers tab with every Docker container’s memory, CPU, network and ports, in the window and the dropdown, and Stop on each, after a confirmation.
- Sound and Bluetooth tabs. The Mac’s output device and level with a slider for every app playing sound, the microphone and the apps using it, and every connected Bluetooth device with its battery, lowest first.
- Units you choose. Celsius or Fahrenheit, bytes or bits for network speed, and CPU per core or per Mac, each with a live example in Settings.
- Temperatures and fans. CPU and GPU temperature on Intel and Apple silicon, M5 included, and fan speed. Hold any fan at a speed you choose, and hand it back to the Mac in one click. The menu bar temperature can follow the CPU, the GPU or the hottest sensor.
- Quit and force quit. Quit an app or a single process, always after a confirmation.
- Keyboard shortcuts and Shortcuts actions. Open the dropdown or the window from any app, and get a reading or the busiest app from the Shortcuts app.
- Export as an image. Save or copy a snapshot of the Mac as a 1200 × 630 share card or a dashboard image.
- In the Dock, if you like. Show in Dock keeps Vitals in the Dock like Activity Monitor. Opened by hand it shows its window; at login it stays in the menu bar.
What Mac users say
Now I find myself stealing quick glances at the menu bar, instead of taking another sip of coffee.
Ed Wiseman Emmy-winning director and producer macOS Activity Monitor is horrible when I’m juggling dev projects and local AI. Vitals is so much better.
Knowix Developer and AI builder cant keep vibecoding everything for $5, i get a finished product, clean ui, and bug fixes
Sai Krishna Founder of Superblog Common questions
Can I run Vitals and iStat Menus together?
Yes. Both are ordinary apps. Vitals's menu bar item can be reduced to a single icon, so the two do not fight for space, and its window works the same either way.
Does Vitals control fans like iStat Menus?
Vitals shows CPU and GPU temperatures and fan speed, and can hold each fan at a speed you choose, next to the apps heating the Mac. It does not change the speed with temperature by itself; TG Pro is built for that, with fan rules.
Can Vitals replace iStat Menus?
If you use iStat Menus for figures in the menu bar, Vitals puts the same ones there (CPU, memory, GPU, network, disk, temperature and battery), one item each in the order you choose, and adds the window behind them. If you use it for weather or fan control, keep it.
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Get Vitals for $9How we compared
The iStat Menus column comes from its maker's own site on September 22, 2026. Where the site does not say whether it does something, the cell says "Not stated". If a cell is out of date, email us and we will fix it.
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Wondering why apps show so many rows in Activity Monitor? Read about helper processes.