Freeware pearls for the Mac: Free problem solvers and little helpers

There is a large selection of Mac software, many great programs are paid for, but there is also a considerable range of useful free tools. For example, they tidy up the menu bar, expand the Quick Look preview or offer faster access to frequently used functions. Many of the apps even do something similar to paid programs. When making our selection, we did without well-known thick ships such as OpenOffice, Firefox or VLC in order to bring less popular apps to light.

1 Design graphics, logos and flyers

The mature and German-language Vectornator impresses with an intuitive interface and hardly misses any functions for occasional designers. For example, you can organize objects into layers, design on multiple artboards, vectorize photos, crop objects with clipping masks, set dynamic drop shadows, and use an isometric construction grid. Keyboard shortcuts and path editing are reminiscent of the likes of Affinity Designer or Illustrator. The vector graphics program can even scale / rotate selected anchor points from a freely selectable origin – not a matter of course.

The integrated library (plus button) provides free stock photos and icons for quick layouts and offers access to Apple’s “SF Symbols” symbol font. With the brush you paint contours with variable strength, which can be edited later. The program imports SVG, AI and multi-page PDF files. In addition to SVG and PDF, the pixel formats PNG and JPEG are available for export. There is no color management and CMYK support, but there is a CMYK preview that you can use to roughly assess how a graphic would look when printed. Documents synchronized via iCloud can be edited on the go in the iPhone and iPad versions of the app, which are also free.