Start a pomodoro timer from your Mac menubar

You sit down to work and the timer is already three clicks away — open Clock, find the Timers tab, type the duration, hit start. By the time it’s running, you’ve already checked Slack. The whole point of a pomodoro is friction-free starting, and the default route on macOS doesn’t quite get there.

Here are the two reasonable paths.

Two paths

The native macOS way (Clock + Shortcuts)

macOS Sonoma added a Clock.app with a Timers tab. You can pin a 25-minute timer there and trigger it via Spotlight (⌘Space then “25 minute timer”), or build a Shortcut and assign it a global hotkey through System Settings > Keyboard > Keyboard Shortcuts > Services.

It works. The honest catch: Clock’s timer doesn’t know what a pomodoro is. It rings once, doesn’t log the session, doesn’t roll into a break, and doesn’t have a notion of “you’ve done four — take a longer rest.” It’s a kitchen timer with a nicer icon.

The Tempo way

Tempo lives in your menubar as a small countdown. One click starts the session; one click pauses it. Everything you’d want is one keystroke or one click away.

1. Download Tempo — it adds itself to your menubar on launch.
2. Click the menubar icon. A small panel drops down with Start, a preset picker, and an optional task label field.
3. Hit Start (or press the global hotkey, configurable in Settings).
4. The menubar now shows the countdown — 24:38, 24:37, ticking down without taking screen space.
5. When the focus block ends, Tempo chimes softly and offers the break. Click once to begin it, or let auto-start handle it.

The session lands in your history automatically — no extra step. Over a week, the menubar becomes your starting line: see the icon, tap, focus. If you forget to start one, the day’s stats quietly remind you tomorrow.

That’s the trade. Apple’s tools can run a timer. Tempo turns the menubar into a launching pad for the habit.