Autopause

AP–001 macOS menu bar

the mic is on.
the song sits down.

Autopause lives in the menu bar. When a microphone turns on, it pauses your music — or fades the volume — and puts it back when you stop. Dictating no longer means lunging for the pause key.

Download for Mac 1.1.1 · notarized zip · 1.5 MB Source on GitHub

Not in the App Store. Unzip it, and move Autopause into Applications. macOS 14 or later.

Listening. Music is up.

Press the mic, or the M key. Pause sits the notes down. Mute leaves them drifting, just very quiet. The real app does this when a microphone is actually in use.

01

It pauses

Music, Spotify, and whatever macOS currently has playing. It starts the song again only if it was the one who stopped it. Press play yourself mid-sentence and Autopause leaves your hands alone.

02

Or it fades

Mute keeps the song running and eases the speakers down, about a third of a second unless you want it instant. Move the volume while it’s quiet and Autopause takes its hand off the fader.

03

It waits out a comma

A second and a half after the mic goes quiet, so the music doesn’t jump back between phrases. Anything shorter than a blink is ignored. Talk again during the wait and it doesn’t start over.

Only the apps you mean

Any microphone will do it, which is right until a call also hushes the room. Dictate once. The app that had the mic shows up by name. Choose “Only these apps,” and the others can talk without touching the music.

It never hears you.

No microphone permission. Autopause watches whether an input is running — it never opens a stream, never records, and has no account. The only thing it fetches is its own update, and it checks the signature before installing.

Into the menu bar

  1. 01 Download the zip and open it.
  2. 02 Drag Autopause into Applications.
  3. 03 Click the mic up top. The fade, the wait, and launch at login live in Settings.

The first time Pause talks to Music or Spotify, macOS asks if that’s okay. Mute never asks. Quit while the sound is ducked and Autopause puts it back.