Keep your Mac awake.
Protect your Liquid Retina screen.
The ultimate dual-engine macOS utility. Execute long-running renders, builds, and downloads with the lid closed — while cutting internal display power to absolute 0.0 nits to eliminate heat traps and screen burn.
brew tap UniversalSDK/dopamine && brew install --cask dopamine
Why Old Keep-Awake Tools Damage Your Mac
Traditional tools like Amphetamine, Caffeine, and KeepingYouAwake were built for older Intel laptops. On modern MacBook Pro Liquid Retina XDR displays, they create dangerous thermal traps.
Thermal & Coating Degradation
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Heat Trapped Against Keyboard: Liquid Retina XDR mini-LEDs pump thermal energy straight into the closed keys, accelerating anti-reflective coating wear.
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Wasted Battery & Cycle Count: Powering millions of display subpixels for an invisible closed screen drains 15–30% more battery every hour.
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Forced Clamshell Cables: Apple default clamshell requires an external power brick and external display just to prevent sleep.
Cold Silicon, Continuous Compute
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Zero-Nit CoreDisplay Cutoff: Direct IOKit / CoreGraphics hardware register call turns off the mini-LED backlight instantly when the lid closes.
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Zero Heat Dissipation to Keys: Your Liquid Retina screen stays stone-cold while CPU/GPU render at maximum performance inside your backpack or desk.
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True Cable-Free Clamshell: No external monitor or power adapter required. Safely compiles Swift, renders Blender, or trains models on battery.
Designed For Professional Mac Workflows
Every feature in Dopamine is engineered with Swift 6 and low-level IOKit APIs to deliver unmatched performance without compromising hardware longevity.
True 0.0 Nits Hardware Blackout
Does not just display a black screensaver. It disengages the physical Mini-LED and OLED backlight controller via IOKit DisplayServices, ensuring zero light bleed and zero keyboard heating.
Cable-Free Clamshell Mode
Apple forces you to connect both power and an external monitor to use Clamshell mode. Dopamine eliminates this constraint safely, allowing fully portable closed-lid operation anywhere.
Automated Battery Safeguard
Set a critical threshold (e.g., 10% or 20%). If battery level drops below your limit or you disconnect MagSafe, Dopamine gracefully relinquishes assertions to prevent accidental deep discharge.
0.0% Idle CPU & 14MB RAM
Written 100% in pure native Swift with AppKit status bar architecture. No Electron, no web views, and no background pollers draining your M-series energy cores.
Decoupled Display & CPU Sleep
Keep CPU compute, audio playback, and network sockets alive while letting your screen go to sleep normally on your desk. Best of both worlds for battery life and workflow continuity.
Privacy-First & Zero Telemetry
No analytics or tracking without explicit user consent. Complies fully with Apple Hardened Runtime. All preferences are stored strictly in your local macOS domain defaults.
Technical Specifications
Pure Swift 6 architecture built specifically for the unified memory architecture of Apple Silicon.
| macOS Compatibility | macOS 12.0 Monterey, 13 Ventura, 14 Sonoma, 15 Sequoia (Fully Tested) |
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| Hardware Architecture | Native ARM64 for Apple Silicon (M1, M1 Pro/Max/Ultra, M2, M3, M4 family) & Intel x86_64 |
| Language & Framework | 100% Pure Swift 6, AppKit, IOKit IOPMAssertion API, CoreDisplay DDC/CI |
| Binary Size & Footprint | < 3 MB download size • < 14 MB RAM usage at runtime • 0.0% idle CPU overhead |
| Security & Runtime | Apple Hardened Runtime, Gatekeeper Notarized, Sandboxing Power Assertion compliant |
| Available Languages | English, Українська, Deutsch, Français, 日本語, Español, 简体中文, Italiano, Português, 한국어, Русский |
| Distribution Formats | Universal Drag-and-Drop .dmg, Enterprise .pkg Installer, Homebrew Cask |
Frequently Asked Questions
Everything you need to know about display safety, power assertions, and installation.
Dopamine uses macOS IOKit power assertion APIs (such as PreventUserIdleSystemSleep) to keep the kernel and background processes running, while registering a low-level DisplayServices hardware notification. When clamshell closure is detected, Dopamine immediately signals the display controller to cut power to the backlight LEDs, achieving genuine 0.0 nits true black without putting the SoC to sleep.
Liquid Retina XDR screens contain thousands of high-intensity mini-LEDs. When legacy tools keep the Mac awake with the lid closed, those mini-LEDs remain continuously energized at high nits inside a sealed, unventilated air gap right against your keyboard keys. Over time, trapped heat can damage delicate anti-reflective coatings and LCD layers. Dopamine physically cuts backlight power to 0 nits, keeping the screen cool.
No. Dopamine includes an automatic Battery Guard monitor. You can configure it to auto-disengage whenever your battery level drops to 10% (or any threshold you choose), or whenever MagSafe is disconnected. This guarantees you will never open your bag to a drained battery.
No! Apple's default macOS clamshell mode strictly demands both an external power adapter and an external display. Dopamine enables standalone clamshell mode: you can close your MacBook on battery power with no cables connected and it will keep your background tasks running seamlessly.
Simply open your Terminal and paste: brew tap UniversalSDK/dopamine && brew install --cask dopamine. Homebrew will automatically verify the SHA-256 checksum and link Dopamine into your /Applications directory.
Protect your Mac. Unleash your workflow.
Download Dopamine today. Zero telemetry, zero bloatware, 100% native Apple Silicon performance.