Ribbon vs Rectangle: snapping on demand vs a layout that stays

Two different jobs

Rectangle is a window snapper. You press a shortcut or drag a window against a screen edge, and that window jumps to a fixed slot: left half, right two-thirds, top-left quarter, full screen. Then Rectangle waits. Open a new window and it appears wherever the app decides, on top of whatever was there.

Ribbon is a window manager. It owns the layout. Every window on a Space becomes a column on a horizontal strip that's wider than your screen. A new window adds a column instead of covering the others, and closing one closes the gap. You move focus with ⌃⌥← and ⌃⌥→, or with a three-finger swipe, and the strip slides along. If that model is new to you, read what a scrolling window manager is first.

So the real question is not which app is better. It's whether you want to place windows yourself, or have them placed for you.

Rectangle and Rectangle Pro in brief

Rectangle is open source under the MIT licence and grew out of the older Spectacle app. It covers halves, thirds, quarters, sixths and smaller fractions, plus maximise, Windows-style snap areas when you drag to an edge, and a few one-shot commands such as Tile All and Cascade. It has a normal settings window and can export its config as JSON. Install it with brew install --cask rectangle or from the DMG on its site.

Current Rectangle releases need macOS 14 Sonoma or later. On Ventura you'd use an older 1.x build that the project still offers.

Rectangle Pro is the paid, closed-source edition: $9.99 once, a 10-day free trial, and one licence for three active Macs. It adds snap areas you draw anywhere on screen, saved layouts that place a whole set of apps with one shortcut (and can run when a display connects), trackpad gestures, and actions to send a window to the next or previous Space.

Neither one re-arranges windows by itself. That's deliberate, and for many people it's exactly right.

Ribbon in brief

Ribbon arranges every window all the time, with one strip per display and per Space. Column widths come from presets that ⌃⌥R cycles through (25% up to 100%). You can stack two windows in one column, show a column as tabs, and float anything that shouldn't tile. Calculator and System Settings float out of the box. A trackpad swipe drags the strip under your fingers and settles on a column.

It runs on macOS 13 Ventura and later, on Apple silicon (M1 or later), and asks only for the Accessibility permission. Every option is a control in a settings window. It costs $9.99 once for one Mac. There's no free trial and all sales are final: no refunds (see the terms). The live demo lets you see the strip move before you decide.

Side by side

When Rectangle is all you need

Be honest about how you actually work. Rectangle, or Rectangle Pro, is the better pick if:

• You usually have two or three windows open and put them side by side once.
• You like overlapping windows and only want a quick way to tidy one up.
• You run a large external monitor split into quarters or sixths that rarely change.
• You don't want to pay, or you want open source.

macOS 15 Sequoia and later can also tile without any app: drag a window to a screen edge, or press fn⌃← for the left half. Our guide to tiling windows on a Mac covers the built-in options. And if a radial menu appeals more than shortcuts, see Ribbon vs Loop.

When Ribbon makes more sense

A scrolling layout pays off when you keep many windows open and switch between them all day. Picture a laptop with an editor, a terminal, a browser, docs and a chat app all in play. Snapping halves on a 14-inch screen turns into constant re-snapping. On a strip, each app keeps a useful width and you scroll to it. That's why the approach suits a MacBook screen and an ultrawide monitor equally well.

It's also the better fit if you'd rather not think about placement at all. You never drag or resize a window by hand.

Can you keep Rectangle installed?

Yes, as long as only one of them runs. Two apps moving the same windows fight: each keeps undoing the other's work. Ribbon's Mac Setup page warns you while Rectangle or Rectangle Pro is running.

1. Quit Rectangle from its menu bar icon.
2. Turn off its launch at login, so it doesn't come back after a restart.
3. Open Ribbon and check that Mac Setup shows no warnings.

Want Rectangle back for a day? Quit Ribbon first, then open Rectangle. The setup guide lists the other macOS settings worth checking, including turning off macOS's own drag-to-tile on Sequoia and later. When you're ready, a licence is $9.99 for one Mac.