AccountyCat is a focus companion for macOS that reads context instead of blocking lists. It sits in your menu bar, sees your active app and window title (and a screenshot only when needed), then quietly nudges when you drift. Sometimes YouTube is procrastination, sometimes it's the tutorial — AC tells the difference. Runs fully on-device with Qwen via llama.cpp, or with your own OpenRouter key. Open source, auditable, private. Interrupting legitimate work is treated as a bug.
Hey Product Hunt 👋
I built AccountyCat because i can't live without a blocking app but strict blocking doesn't work. There is always an exception needed and I just ended up unblocking everything again all the time. Not helpful for me.
AC watches the active app and window title and takes a screenshot when the text context isn't enough. An LLM decides whether to stay quiet, nudge gently, or ask (accountability). Most checks result in nothing happening. When thinks you're drifting off, it will nudge you.
A few more things:
• Two modes. Everyday tolerates errands, breaks, life admin. Named focus sessions are stricter — you opted in.
• It learns. Correct it, set a rule, click "it's fine" on a nudge — AC remembers. Repeated patterns surface as suggestions you accept or dismiss, never silent changes.
• Open source (feel free to contribute to make it even better:)). Screen Recording and Accessibility are serious permissions. You can read exactly what happens with them.
• Your choice of brain. Fully on-device with Qwen (no account, no key, no internet), or BYOK via OpenRouter with ZDR enforced. A managed flat-fee option is on the waitlist.
Apple Silicon only for now. MIT licensed.
Would love feedback — especially from anyone who's bounced off blocking apps before. What does focus tooling get wrong for you?
— Jonas
Focus tools that 'get context' are the holy grail — most of them either timer-bro-shame you or try to be a full second brain. Curious where AccountyCat lands on that spectrum. Asking because I built the Excel for Financial Modelling course on Udemy and a recurring student-question pattern is: 'how do you focus deeply enough to actually internalize the structural side of a model vs. just clicking through tutorials?' Most of them are missing exactly this — a focus layer that adapts to the depth of work, not just blocks notifications.
Very cool idea and implementation! and there are even three characters to choose from, wow! one thing i'm wondering: if i usually switch between tasks, will my cat be confused? 🙂
The distinction between "procrastination" YouTube vs "tutorial" YouTube is genuinely clever. Curious how AC handles ambiguous cases over time: does the nudge frequency adapt as it learns your personal patterns, or does each session start fresh? And is there a way to review the reasoning behind a nudge after the fact, like a log of why it flagged something?
Congrats on the launch, Jonas! 😸 I came across this by chance and visited your website. I have tried many distraction blocking apps and they didn't work much. I would get calls or there would be something or the other. So, I'll unblock the apps and it totally beats the purpose of it.
Your Accounty Cat seems cool but I have a question. You've mentioned on your website that screenshots are analysed and discarded. I have to follow strict privacy policies at work. Is there a way that I can enable Accounty Cat for only certain apps and not my whole system?
I just shipped a small free test run for AC. I’m looking for honest early feedback: use code ACFIRST during setup for a zero-cost cloud-AI (OpenRouter - Zero Data Retention) trial, usually enough to properly try it out. Download, paste the code, grant permissions, and you’re in 😁 Tell me what helped, what felt annoying, and what would make you keep using it. 🤗
About AccountyCat on Product Hunt
“A focus companion that actually gets context”
AccountyCat launched on Product Hunt on May 28th, 2026 and earned 114 upvotes and 20 comments, placing #13 on the daily leaderboard. AccountyCat is a focus companion for macOS that reads context instead of blocking lists. It sits in your menu bar, sees your active app and window title (and a screenshot only when needed), then quietly nudges when you drift. Sometimes YouTube is procrastination, sometimes it's the tutorial — AC tells the difference. Runs fully on-device with Qwen via llama.cpp, or with your own OpenRouter key. Open source, auditable, private. Interrupting legitimate work is treated as a bug.
AccountyCat was featured in Productivity (652.7k followers), Open Source (68.4k followers), GitHub (41.2k followers) and Menu Bar Apps (12.2k followers) on Product Hunt. Together, these topics include over 172.2k products, making this a competitive space to launch in.
Who hunted AccountyCat?
AccountyCat was hunted by Jonas Strabel. A “hunter” on Product Hunt is the community member who submits a product to the platform — uploading the images, the link, and tagging the makers behind it. Hunters typically write the first comment explaining why a product is worth attention, and their followers are notified the moment they post. Around 79% of featured launches on Product Hunt are self-hunted by their makers, but a well-known hunter still acts as a signal of quality to the rest of the community. See the full all-time top hunters leaderboard to discover who is shaping the Product Hunt ecosystem.
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Jonas Strabel