Apple users are finding some of the best discounts we’ve seen this year for premium software, with stellar Black Friday sales on productivity, creativity and utility apps for Mac, iPhone and iPad. If you recently bought new gear, now is the time to add accessories without breaking the bank — particularly for one-time purchases that are rarely discounted.
Standout Mac app deals to get during Black Friday
Things 3, the sophisticated task manager from Cultured Code that is a recipient of an Apple Design Award, is also 30% off throughout its ecosystem. That lowers the price of the Mac app to $34.99 from $49.99. Things is a one-time purchase with no subscription, so this sale merits attention; it’s one of the few veritably predictable annual discounts for the top-tier productivity app that reviewers at Wirecutter and MacStories say make them more organized.
CleanShot X, the power users’ app of choice for screenshots, scrolling captures, GIFs and on-the-fly annotations, is 31 percent off on the developer’s site — $20 down from $29. A better deal, meanwhile, is offered as part of a seasonal bundle that prices CleanShot X at roughly $14.50, or bundles it with a 12-app collection (including Unclutter and DaisyDisk) for $76. If you’re someone who records workflows, writes tutorials or helps customers, CleanShot’s HUD mode, OCR text capture and fast annotation tools can genuinely save you time.
Bartender 6, the venerable utility for taming a super-packed macOS menu bar, is 20% off its standard $20 price. It allows you to hide, group and style menu bar icons, as well as invoke them via keyboard shortcuts. For those with crowded menu bars in macOS Sequoia following fresh installs, Bartender can bring order in moments.
For less than $3, you can grab Yoink, a staggeringly useful but extremely simple drag-and-drop shelf for moving files between apps and Finder windows via a popular pay-what-you-want bundle. Longtime file wranglers are going to wonder how they ever lived without it; reduced misdrops and context switching with temporary staging.
For all your devices, PastePal is a universal clipboard manager with timeline and category views that you can now get for 50 percent off at $7.99. It handles both text and media, features a quick-access sidebar on Mac, and syncs history across Apple platforms — meaning your copied items travel with you.
iPhone and iPad app standouts worth grabbing now
Things 3 on iPhone is $6.99 (down from $9.99) and for iPad, it is on sale for $13.99 (down from $19.99). That’s a separate purchase for each platform, but without a subscription (and this being the once-in-a-blue-moon discount), it’s as good a time as any for prospective buyers to grab three apps where they can have trusty offline task management with fast syncing.
PastePal’s universal pricing, reduced by 50%, is nice for iOS and iPadOS users because its cross-device clipboard sync obviates the “where did I copy that?” practice that cost me so much time, spiraling between Mac and mobile. If you transfer snippets from Safari on iPhone to email on Mac all the time, then it’s a small cost for a convenience that immediately feels as if it has paid off.
Subscription Day, a Mac utility to monitor subscription counts in a clean calendar view, is 50% off at $5.99 and offers a free iOS version when it launches. For those users balancing various types of apps, subscriptions and cloud storage and streaming services, proactive notifications can help prevent surprise renewals and even surface what to cancel before the next cycle runs.
Bundles to stretch your budget on useful Mac utilities
Once again this year, seasonal bundles are feeling a little too generous. From desktop organization to storage cleanup, CleanShot X, Unclutter and DaisyDisk are among the dozen apps packed in the $76 set of utilities from the AMTP Team called the Unclutter Collection that handle everyday tasks. Bundles often contain hundreds of dollars in list price, but the true perk is amassing tools that you’ll actually use — and having the opportunity to seize perpetual licenses when possible.
How to tell the real wins from gimmicky app discounts
Your first targets are likely one-time purchases (something that hardly ever goes on sale) or cross-platform licenses (to prevent you from having to buy the same thing twice). Search for Universal Purchase and Family Sharing in the App Store. On the Mac in particular, ensure compatibility with the latest operating systems and Apple silicon, as well as export support to prevent lock-in to a proprietary format.
Yes, holiday deal fatigue is real, but software is not hardware: the value of benefits accrues every day. We also regularly hear that indie developers love it when app revenues hit an annual peak around Black Friday and, sure enough, responsive support and active roadmaps often ensue. If you are interested in supporting the tools that you depend on, this is a good time to buy because it supports the people who make them.
Bottom line: If you have a need for class-leading task management, a slicker screenshot workflow or a less crazy menu bar, or can’t live without synchronized clipboards, these Mac and iOS app discounts this year are offering great value.
Act fast — most sales have expiration dates — and pile up a stack of apps that makes your new Apple hardware feel whole.
