From purchase to your first layout

Get the app and your license key

Buy Universal Display Magnet from the download page. After checkout, Polar, the payment provider, takes you to your purchase in the Polar customer portal. There you can:

• Download the ZIP. One file runs on Apple silicon and Intel Macs.
• Copy your license key. The app asks for it when it first opens.

You can come back to the portal later with the email address you bought with. License and updates explains how.

Install and activate

1. Open the ZIP from your Downloads folder to unzip it.
2. Drag Universal Display Magnet into your Applications folder, then open it from there.
3. The window asks for your license. Paste the key into License key and click Activate.

Activation needs an internet connection. Until the app is activated, its window and menu bar panel show only the license form, and it changes nothing on your Mac. Your license covers three Macs.

Allow the permissions

Universal Display Magnet asks for two permissions:

• Device Control and Data Access, to see and move other apps' windows. Turn on Universal Display Magnet under System Settings → Privacy & Security → Device Control and Data Access. Older versions of macOS call this list Accessibility, as Apple's guide Allow accessibility apps to access your Mac does.
• Local Network, to find and sync with your other Macs. Click Allow when macOS asks.

It never asks to record your screen. You can check the first permission at any time under Settings → Permissions in the app.

Choose your first task

Pick the one that brought you here. You can do the others later.

Fix your display arrangement

1. Open Displays. Your monitors appear as you have them now.
2. Drag each display to where it really sits on your desk. It snaps flush against its neighbors. Snap All pulls every display together at once.
3. Click Apply. The new arrangement takes effect right away.
4. Choose Keep within 15 seconds. If you don't, it goes back to the old arrangement, so a mistake can't leave you with screens you can't use.

Once kept, the arrangement is saved for this set of monitors and put back when they reconnect, wake or get moved by macOS. More on display arrangement.

Save a workspace

1. Put your apps' windows where you want them, on each display and Desktop.
2. Choose Save Workspace… in Workspaces or in the menu bar, name it, and choose which apps to include.
3. Restore it any time from the menu bar, the Dock menu or its own shortcut.

To put windows back on the right Desktop, the app uses the macOS Switch to Desktop shortcuts (⌃1…⌃0). If they are off, choose Enable ⌃1…⌃0 in Workspaces. Restoring a workspace opens its apps that aren't running before moving their windows; automatic restores never open apps. More on workspaces.

Arrange several Macs

1. Install Universal Display Magnet on each Mac and activate it.
2. Link the Macs once with Universal Control under System Settings → Displays → Link to Mac or iPad.
3. Open Universal Control. Every Mac's displays appear. Drag the other Macs' displays where they sit, and Undo Last Change if you need to.

The Macs find each other on your network and sync on their own. The guide Universal Control between Macs goes step by step.

Good to know

• Closing the window keeps Universal Display Magnet running in the menu bar, so shortcuts, snapping and sync keep working. Choose Quit in the menu bar panel to stop it.
• Open at login. It opens at login from then on. Turn that off with Launch at login under Settings → General.
• Scrolling Windows is optional and off by default. To see it without moving your real windows, open Scrolling Windows and choose Take the Tour. While it's on, window snapping and automatic window snapshots pause.

If something goes wrong

These are three different problems with different fixes.

The app won't open

• Check that your Mac runs macOS 14 or later. See compatibility.
• Unzip the download first, then open the copy in Applications, not the ZIP or a copy left in Downloads.
• The app is signed and notarized by Apple, so it should open normally. If macOS still refuses, download the ZIP again from the portal. If that doesn't help, email us the exact message macOS shows.

It asks for permission again

• Open System Settings → Privacy & Security → Device Control and Data Access and check that Universal Display Magnet is listed and on.
• If it's on but the app still asks, remove it with −, add it again and reopen the app.
• Keep only one copy of the app, in Applications.

The license isn't accepted

• Paste the whole key, with no spaces before or after it.
• Activation needs the internet. "Cannot reach Polar right now" means the connection failed, not the key.
• "Polar could not activate this license" usually means every activation on your license is in use, on three Macs. Deactivate one first; License and updates shows how.
• "This license or activation is no longer valid" means Polar refused it. Check the purchase in the customer portal, then email us.

Still stuck? Email support@clevermechanisms.dev with your macOS version, your Mac models and what happened.