Hackathons are chaos by design. You've got 24–48 hours to go from zero to demo, and every wasted minute is a feature you won't ship. Your Mac setup matters more than you think.
After doing a handful of hackathons over the past couple years, I've dialed in a toolkit that keeps me fast, focused, and not burning money while I sprint. Here are the 7 apps I install before every event.
1. Raycast — The Launcher That Replaces Five Apps
Raycast is a Spotlight replacement on steroids. Clipboard history, snippet expansion, window management, quick calculations — it does all of it from one keyboard shortcut. During a hackathon, I use it to switch between projects, run scripts, and manage windows without touching my trackpad. The built-in AI chat is handy for quick questions when you don't want to leave your editor.
Free (Pro available) → raycast.com
2. Warp — A Terminal Built for Speed
Warp is what happens when you redesign the terminal from scratch. Block-based output, AI command suggestions, and real collaborative features. During a hackathon, the AI command search alone saves me from Googling obscure flags. It's noticeably faster to navigate than iTerm2 when you're running a dozen commands a minute.
Free → warp.dev
3. CleanShot X — Screenshots for Demo Day
CleanShot X captures screenshots and recordings with annotations, scrolling capture, and instant cloud upload. When you're building your demo deck at 3 AM and need to show your UI in action, this app pays for itself. The OCR feature is great for grabbing text from error screenshots too.
$29 one-time → cleanshot.com
4. TokenBar — Know Exactly What Your AI Sprint Is Costing
TokenBar sits in your menu bar and tracks LLM token usage across providers in real time. During a hackathon, you're probably hammering GPT-4 or Claude for code generation, debugging, and brainstorming. TokenBar shows you exactly how many tokens you've burned and what it's costing — so you don't come home to a $40 surprise on your API bill. It's $5 lifetime, which is less than one bad API call.
$5 lifetime → tokenbar.site
5. Monk Mode — Kill the Feeds, Keep the Focus
Monk Mode blocks distracting feeds at the content level — not the entire app. So you can still use Twitter for API docs or YouTube for a tutorial, but the infinite scroll feeds are gone. During a hackathon weekend, I turn it on Friday evening and don't touch it until Sunday after demos. It's the difference between shipping a feature and doomscrolling at 2 AM when your energy is low.
$15 lifetime → mac.monk-mode.lifestyle
6. Rectangle — Window Management Without Thinking
Rectangle lets you snap windows into position with keyboard shortcuts. Left half, right half, thirds, quarters — whatever your layout needs. At a hackathon, I run editor on the left, terminal on the right, browser in a corner. Rectangle makes rearranging instant. It's open source and completely free.
Free (open source) → rectangleapp.com
7. Numi — A Calculator That Thinks Like You Do
Numi is a text-based calculator where you type natural language math. Need to figure out API pricing? "4000 tokens * $0.03 / 1000 = ?" — just type it. It handles unit conversions, percentages, and variables. During hackathons, I keep it open for quick back-of-napkin math on pricing, timing, and resource estimates.
Free → numi.app
The Setup
My hackathon launch sequence looks like this:
- Rectangle — snap my windows into place
- Monk Mode — block feeds for the duration
- Warp — open terminal, clone the repo
- Raycast — set up project-specific snippets
- TokenBar — start tracking API costs from minute one
- Numi — open for quick math
- CleanShot X — ready for screenshots when demo time hits
The whole setup takes about 5 minutes, and it means I spend the next 24–48 hours actually building instead of fighting my environment.
What's in your hackathon toolkit? Drop your must-have apps in the comments — always looking to optimize the setup.
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