MacKeeper Alternatives: Safer Ways to Tune a Mac

MacKeeper is one of the most searched-for Mac utilities, largely because of how heavily it has been advertised over the years. If you are looking for an alternative, the useful question is which of its features you actually need, because macOS covers several of them already.

What it is

MacKeeper bundles cleaning, antivirus, a VPN, ad blocking and privacy tools into one subscription. It is a broad suite rather than a focused utility.

Where they overlap

The overlap with Mainspring is narrow: both can change some system behaviour and both talk about making your Mac faster.

Where they differ

• Scope. MacKeeper is a bundle of loosely related services. Mainspring does one thing: hidden settings, reversibly.
• Model. MacKeeper is a subscription. Mainspring is one-time.
• What you may not need. macOS includes XProtect and Gatekeeper, so a separate antivirus is optional for most people. App permissions and analytics are settings you can change yourself in minutes.

Which should you use?

Split the problem up. For privacy, work through a proper checklist of the settings that actually matter. For speed, the causes are usually animations, login items and a full disk. For a VPN, buy a VPN from a company whose only business is VPNs. Bundled suites tend to be a worse version of each individual tool.

Every setting here is a one-click, reversible toggle in Mainspring — no Terminal, and an undo button on all of it.