AeroSpace — Stop swiping, start switching

I have a problem with Cmd+Tab. Not the shortcut itself — the mental overhead. When you’re switching between Slack, a browser, Cursor, a terminal, and a second browser profile twenty times an hour, Cmd+Tab becomes a slot machine. You press it, squint at the icons, overshoot, go back, and finally land on the right window. Three seconds, every time.

Multiply that by a full workday and you’ve spent real minutes just navigating.

Swiping between macOS Spaces is worse. The animation is pretty, sure. But it’s also slow, non-deterministic (which direction was Slack again?), and breaks the moment you rearrange anything.

So I started using AeroSpace, and switching apps now feels like muscle memory.

What AeroSpace does differently

AeroSpace is an i3-style tiling window manager for macOS. The two things that matter most:

1. It ignores macOS Spaces entirely. It implements its own virtual workspace system. Switching is instant — no animations, no Mission Control, no slide transitions.
2. It doesn’t need SIP disabled. Unlike yabai (which needs System Integrity Protection off for full features), AeroSpace works within Apple’s public accessibility APIs. It survives macOS updates without drama.

The config is a single TOML file. You version-control it, copy it to a new machine, and you’re done.

My setup: one key per app

Here’s the idea. Instead of numbered workspaces, I use mnemonic workspaces — each workspace is named after the app that lives there. One keypress, one app. No thinking.

Binding	App	Workspace
Alt+M	Slack	M
Alt+B	Browser (Arc)	B
Alt+P	Personal browser profile	P
Alt+K	Cursor	K
Alt+I	Terminal	I
Alt+N	Notes / utility	N
Alt+V	Video / utility	V

I press Alt+K and I’m in Cursor. Alt+M and I’m in Slack. There’s no ambiguity, no hunting, no animation delay. It’s instant.

The config

Install AeroSpace first:

brew install --cask nikitabobko/tap/aerospace

Then drop this in ~/.aerospace.toml:

start-at-login = true

[gaps]
inner.horizontal = 8
inner.vertical   = 8
outer.left       = 8
outer.right      = 8
outer.top        = 8
outer.bottom     = 8

[mode.main.binding]

# ── App workspaces (the good stuff) ──
alt-m = 'workspace M'
alt-b = 'workspace B'
alt-p = 'workspace P'
alt-k = 'workspace K'
alt-i = 'workspace I'
alt-n = 'workspace N'
alt-v = 'workspace V'

# ── Move focused window to a workspace ──
alt-shift-m = 'move-node-to-workspace M'
alt-shift-b = 'move-node-to-workspace B'
alt-shift-p = 'move-node-to-workspace P'
alt-shift-k = 'move-node-to-workspace K'
alt-shift-i = 'move-node-to-workspace I'
alt-shift-n = 'move-node-to-workspace N'
alt-shift-v = 'move-node-to-workspace V'

# ── Window focus ──
alt-h = 'focus left'
alt-j = 'focus down'
alt-l = 'focus right'

# ── Move windows ──
alt-shift-h = 'move left'
alt-shift-j = 'move down'
alt-shift-l = 'move right'

# ── Layout ──
alt-f = 'fullscreen'
alt-comma  = 'layout v_accordion'
alt-period = 'layout h_accordion'
alt-slash  = 'layout tiles'

# ── Workspace back-and-forth ──
alt-tab = 'workspace-back-and-forth'

# ── Auto-route apps to their workspaces ──
[[on-window-detected]]
if.app-id = 'com.tinyspeck.slackmacgap'
run = 'move-node-to-workspace M'

[[on-window-detected]]
if.app-id = 'company.thebrowser.Browser'
run = 'move-node-to-workspace B'

[[on-window-detected]]
if.app-id = 'com.todesktop.230313mzl4w4u92'
run = 'move-node-to-workspace K'

[[on-window-detected]]
if.app-id = 'dev.warp.Warp-Stable'
run = 'move-node-to-workspace I'

The [[on-window-detected]] blocks are what make this seamless. When Slack opens, it automatically lands in workspace M. When Cursor opens, it goes to K. You never have to manually move anything.

How the workspace model works

AeroSpace doesn’t touch macOS Spaces at all. It manages its own set of virtual workspaces by moving windows off-screen when they’re not active. That sounds like a hack, but it means:

• Instant switching. No animation, no transition. The workspace is just there.
• Unlimited workspaces. macOS Spaces caps out. AeroSpace doesn’t care — name them whatever you want.
• No Mission Control weirdness. Spaces rearranging themselves, desktops moving around after a reboot — none of that.

One setting I’d recommend changing in macOS:

# Prevents multi-monitor focus issues
defaults write com.apple.spaces spans-displays -bool true

Then log out and back in.

Why this beats Cmd+Tab

Cmd+Tab is a sequential operation. You cycle through a list. The more apps you have open, the worse it gets.

AeroSpace bindings are random access. Each app has a fixed address. Alt+M is always Slack, whether you have 3 apps open or 15. Your fingers learn the mapping in a day or two, and after that you stop thinking about window management entirely.

That’s the whole point. Window management should be invisible. You think “I need the terminal” and your hand hits Alt+I before the thought finishes.

Compared to the alternatives

If you’ve looked at macOS tiling managers before, here’s where AeroSpace sits:

• yabai: More powerful (borders, opacity, custom rules), but requires SIP off and breaks on macOS updates. If you want to live on the edge, yabai is great. I wanted something that just works after every update.
• Amethyst: Good automatic tiling, but uses native macOS Spaces. That means animations and the occasional macOS bug. No mnemonic workspaces.
• Rectangle: Not a tiling manager — it’s a window snapping tool. Great for casual use, not the same thing.

AeroSpace hits the sweet spot: i3-level configurability without needing to disable system protections.

Give it a try

If you spend your day juggling between 5+ apps and you’re tired of the Cmd+Tab dance, AeroSpace is worth 10 minutes of setup. Write a config, map your most-used apps to keys that make sense, and see how fast your workflow gets.

The official guide and command reference cover everything. The GitHub repo is at nikitabobko/AeroSpace.

My config is up in my dotfiles if you want to grab the full version.