What it costs
Mac App Store
per month
Cancel any time. That is $119.88 a year. The annual plan is $39.99 a year.
Mac App Store
one-time lifetime
The regular price of a permanent unlock.
AppSumo
one-time lifetime
The same permanent unlock, on the more capable build.
Save $49.99 — 62% off the lifetime price
Here is the part worth pausing on. Renting Spaceback for one year on the App Store annual plan costs $39.99. This is $30, once. That is less than a single year of the subscription, and it never renews.
Against the monthly plan it pays for itself in three months. No subscription, no renewal, and no upsell tier waiting behind the purchase. One payment, every Pro tool, every future update.
Why the AppSumo build is cheaper and better
That combination usually means a catch, so here is the actual reason. Spaceback ships in two editions from one codebase:
Apple takes a commission on App Store sales and AppSumo takes a share here. The difference is that this edition does not carry the sandbox, so it also reads the shared caches in /Library that sit outside your home folder entirely — storage the Store build is not permitted to open at all. You are paying less for the version that reaches further.
What you get
Also included: 32 languages you can pick inside the app, a menu bar item, Shortcuts and Spotlight actions, and six accent colours that retint the app and its Dock icon.
What it will not do
Cleaners have a trust problem because they overpromise. So, plainly:
- It is not antivirus. Security Check has no virus database and never claims to find malware.
- It will not invent a risk score or a fake urgency number to make you click.
- It will not touch your Mail, Messages, Safari or Photos libraries. Spaceback excludes them by name — including in this edition, which has no sandbox and could otherwise reach them.
- It will not delete anything silently. Removals go to the Trash whenever macOS gives a way back, and failures are reported rather than hidden.
- Some space cannot be freed by deleting files. Simulator runtimes and APFS snapshots are two of them. Spaceback names them and hands you Apple's own command rather than taking privileges a cleaner should not hold.
How to activate
Requires macOS 14 or later. Apple silicon and Intel. Scanning is free without a licence, so you can measure your whole Mac before deciding.
Questions
Is this really lifetime?
Yes. One payment, no renewal, and future updates arrive through the app's own signed updater.
Do I need an account?
No. The licence is a signed file the app verifies on your Mac. There is nothing to sign into.
What does the app send over the internet?
When you activate, it asks our server once whether that licence has been refunded. It sends a one-way hash of your licence key, an installation id derived from your Mac's hardware UUID, and the app version — never file names, paths, file contents or scan results. Those two identifiers are pseudonymous rather than anonymous: we issued your licence, so we can link them back to your purchase. The server writes nothing when you check — the request is a read, and the only rows it holds are for licences we have deliberately revoked. If it cannot reach us, the app keeps working.
Can I use it on more than one Mac?
Yes, on every Mac you own. Nothing is enforced: no seat limit, no activation cap, and no Mac is ever blocked. Our server does not even count your activations: the check is a read, and nothing about it is written down.
How is this different from the App Store version?
Same app, without the sandbox. It reaches system-level caches the Store build is not permitted to open, and it is the edition that gets the developer-junk rules.
What if it does not find anything worth deleting?
Then it will tell you that, and you should keep your money. Scanning is free precisely so you can check first.