Inside Spotcursor: A Pointer Everyone Can Follow

Spotcursor is a small Mac utility from 1dot1 that makes the pointer easy to follow for anyone watching. It puts a halo round the pointer, sends out a ripple on every click, can dim the whole screen except for a circle round the pointer, and can show the shortcuts being pressed. This teardown walks through it screen by screen and explains the decisions behind each part.

The problem it answers is familiar to anyone who has shared a screen. On a projector, in a video call or in a recording squeezed into a small window, the macOS arrow is a few pixels wide and moves faster than an audience can track. The presenter knows where it is; the viewers are hunting for it. Worse, a click leaves no trace at all, and a keyboard shortcut is completely invisible. Spotcursor adds just enough on top of the screen to close that gap, and then gets out of the way.

A halo that is already on

The halo is switched on from the first launch: a soft grey circle that follows the pointer. There is no set-up screen to get through before it is useful, because the most common reason to open the app is that a call or a talk is about to start.

It works on every display and every Space, full-screen apps included. That matters more than it sounds. Presentations usually run full screen, often on a second display, and a highlight that vanishes the moment Keynote or a browser goes full screen is no help at the one moment it is needed.

The halo is drawn on a click-through overlay. It never takes a click, so everything underneath behaves exactly as it did before the app was opened. A highlight that changed how the Mac responded would be one more thing to think about during a demo.

Every click, easy to follow

With Click ripples switched on, every click sends out a ring from the pointer. A left click is one quick, solid ring. A right click is a slower, dashed double ring.

The two look different on purpose. In a tutorial the difference between a left and a right click is often the whole point of the step, and on a recording there is no other way to see which one happened. Shape carries the difference rather than colour, so it still reads in a greyscale video, on a washed-out projector, or for viewers who do not distinguish colours well.

Ripples use the halo's colour, and they follow the Only while holding a key setting too, so the two always behave as one feature.

One thing at a time

Press Control-Option-S and the whole screen darkens except for a soft circle round the pointer, which moves with it. Radius sets how big the bright circle is, and Dim sets how dark the rest of the screen goes. Press the same shortcut again to bring the screen back.

A halo says where the pointer is. A spotlight says where to look, which is a stronger instruction and useful for a different moment: walking through a dense chart, one bar at a time, or pointing at a single line of a long document. The edge of the circle is soft rather than sharp, so it guides the eye without looking like a hole cut in the screen.

With more than one display, the displays the pointer is not on are dimmed completely. The Spotcursor panel always sits above the spotlight, so settings stay readable while it is on.

Spotlight is also the one setting that is never remembered. It always starts switched off when the app opens. A dark screen after a restart, with no memory of why, would be alarming, so the app simply does not allow it.

Shortcuts, shown as pressed

Switch on Show shortcuts on screen and each shortcut pressed, such as ?C or ??4, appears in a dark pill near the bottom of the screen the pointer is on, then fades away. Press the same shortcut several times in quick succession and it counts up in one pill, for example ?Z ×3, instead of filling the screen with copies.

This is the feature with the most privacy weight, and the defaults reflect that. It is off until switched on. When it is on, only shortcuts are shown: combinations with Command, Control or Option. Ordinary typing, including anything typed into a password field during a live demo, stays private. For tutorials where every key matters, Every key, not only shortcuts shows plain key presses as well.

Keys are only drawn on screen for a moment. They are never saved, logged or sent anywhere. Seeing key presses does need the Input Monitoring permission from macOS, and this is the only part of Spotcursor that asks for any permission at all.

Ring, fill or both

The Halo section starts with a choice of Ring, Fill or Both. A ring leaves the thing under the pointer fully visible; a fill is easier to spot from the back of a room; both together combines the two.

Size and Opacity are sliders rather than presets, because the right halo depends on the screen resolution, the distance to the audience and what is being pointed at. The aim is a halo that is easy to see without hiding what is underneath.

Colour offers black, white and grey, plus Pick… for one highlight colour of your own. The halo changes live while the colour window is open, so the right shade can be found against the real content rather than guessed.

Only while holding a key

Set Show to While holding Fn, Option, Control or Command, and the halo stays hidden until that key is held down, disappearing the moment it is let go. It suits presenters who want to point at one thing and then have a clean screen again, without reaching for a shortcut twice.

For anything in between, Control-Option-H hides or shows the halo from any app, and the menu bar icon turns its rings dotted while the halo is off, so its state is never a mystery.

Built in black and white

Like the other 1dot1 Mac apps, Spotcursor is greyscale. The icon is an arrow with rings spreading out from its tip, and the menu bar glyph repeats it at a smaller size. The default halo is grey, the keystroke pills are dark, and the spotlight is a plain dimming of the screen. The one exception is the optional highlight colour, which is there because some content needs it and left to the person presenting.

Everything lives in a single panel under the menu bar icon, with a right-click menu for quick switches. It is a universal app for Apple silicon and Intel Macs, runs on macOS 13 Ventura or later, and never connects to the internet. In testing it used about 1% of the processor with the halo on.

How to use it, feature by feature

The same instructions are in the short PDF inside the download.

Installing and opening

1. Unzip the download and drag Spotcursor.app into the Applications folder, then open it. An arrow-and-rings icon appears in the menu bar.
2. Spotcursor is signed and notarized by Apple, so it opens with a normal double-click.
3. Click the menu bar icon for all the settings. Right-click it for quick switches: Halo, Spotlight, Click Ripples and Keystrokes.

The halo

1. The halo is on from the first launch and follows the pointer on every display and Space.
2. Choose Ring, Fill or Both at the top of the Halo section.
3. Drag Size and Opacity until it is easy to see.
4. Pick black, white or grey, or click Pick… to choose one highlight colour. The halo changes live while the colour window is open.
5. Press Control-Option-H from any app to hide or show it. The menu bar icon turns its rings dotted while the halo is off.

Only while holding a key

1. Set Show to While holding Fn, Option, Control or Command.
2. Hold that key to see the halo; let go and it disappears.
3. Set Show back to Always to keep it on screen all the time.

Click ripples

1. Turn on Click ripples.
2. A left click sends out one quick solid ring; a right click sends out a slower, dashed double ring.
3. Ripples use the halo's colour and follow the Show setting.

Spotlight

1. Press Control-Option-S, or switch on Dim everything but the pointer.
2. Drag Radius to size the bright circle, and Dim to set how dark the rest of the screen goes.
3. Other displays are dimmed completely while the pointer is elsewhere.
4. Press Control-Option-S again to bring the screen back. Spotlight always starts off when the app opens.

Keystrokes

1. Switch on Show shortcuts on screen. Shortcuts appear in a dark pill near the bottom of the screen the pointer is on, then fade.
2. Only combinations with Command, Control or Option are shown unless Every key, not only shortcuts is switched on.
3. Repeated presses of the same shortcut count up in one pill, for example ?Z ×3.

Permissions

1. The halo, click ripples and spotlight need no permissions.
2. Keystrokes need Input Monitoring. When the feature is switched on without it, press Grant Access in the panel.
3. In System Settings, Privacy & Security, Input Monitoring, switch Spotcursor on.
4. Quit and reopen Spotcursor. Keys are never saved, logged or sent anywhere.

Settings and start-up

1. Every setting is remembered between launches, apart from Spotlight.
2. Tick Open at Login to have Spotcursor ready whenever the Mac starts.
3. The ellipsis button in the panel has About Spotcursor and Quit Spotcursor.

If something does not happen

1. No halo: check the Halo switch at the top of the panel, press Control-Option-H, and check that Show is set to Always.
2. Control-Option-H or Control-Option-S does nothing: another app already owns that combination. Use the panel switches or the right-click menu.
3. No shortcut pills: Input Monitoring is missing, or was granted without reopening the app. Press Grant Access, switch Spotcursor on, then quit and reopen it.
4. Plain typing does not show: that is the default. Switch on Every key, not only shortcuts.
5. The halo does not show in a screen recording: if the recorder leaves out other apps' windows, allow Spotcursor in its settings.
6. The screen is stuck dark: press Control-Option-S, or right-click the menu bar icon and untick Spotlight. Quitting Spotcursor also removes it.

Get Spotcursor

Spotcursor is available on 1dot1 as a single download, with the guide, a README and the licence inside the zip.

Get It Now