This is what each app does today, read from its public pages in October 2026. Switchboard is Mac only and needs macOS 26. If I’ve got something wrong about another app, tell me and I’ll fix it.
| Switchboard | Keyboard Maestro | BetterTouchTool | Raycast | Alfred | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Buy once, no subscription needed | Yes | Yes | Yes | Subscription | Yes |
| Hotkey macros with steps and conditions | Yes | Yes | Partly | Partly | Yes |
| Trackpad gestures and key remaps | Yes | Partly | Yes | No | No |
| Clicks by UI element: a scored match, with the score in the trace, and a fallback to screen text | Yes | Partly | Partly | No | No |
| Run traces, with a per-event reason for what didn’t run | Yes | Partly | No | No | Partly |
| Text expansion | Yes | Yes | No | Yes | Yes |
| Clipboard history | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Launcher: apps, menu commands, calculator | Yes | Partly | No | Yes | Yes |
| File and folder rules | Yes | Partly | No | No | No |
| Imports the other apps’ libraries | Yes | No | No | No | No |
| Guardrails before an event reaches the app | Yes | No | No | No | No |
| Agents run your macros over MCP, with approval | Yes | No | Partly | No | No |
| iPhone and Watch as sensors, pad and approver | Yes | No | Partly | No | Partly |
| Open extension gallery (Switchboard’s is small and new) | Yes | Partly | Partly | Yes | Yes |
| AI with your own key, free | Yes | No | Yes | Subscription | Partly |
| Macros as plain text files | Yes | No | Partly | Partly | Partly |
| Window management: snapping and layouts | No | Yes | Yes | Yes | Partly |
| Years shipping | New in 2026 | Over 20 | Over 10 | Over 5 | Over 10 |
| Size of the action and trigger catalogue | Smaller | Larger | Larger | Larger | Larger |
| Extension store with third-party authors | No | No | No | Yes | Yes |
| Windows version | No | No | No | Yes | No |
Switchboard does not do window management. Raycast and Rectangle do it well, and an extension can add it here. Raycast figures are for Raycast Pro where a price is involved.
What you keep. Every hotkey macro imports, including the variables and conditions, and the tokens and calculation functions they use. Keyboard Maestro keeps its hotkeys until you turn each group on in Switchboard.
What you gain. Guardrails that run before a key reaches the app, and element clicks that report how sure they were. Every run has a trace, and every event that fired nothing gets a reason. You also get agents over MCP and the iPhone and Watch apps.
What you keep. Trackpad gestures, mouse triggers and keyboard shortcuts import. Each trigger and its action become one macro, scoped to the app the trigger belonged to.
What you gain. Conditions and variables on every trigger, plus element clicks and guardrails, and a trace for each run. Snippets are built in. Agents over MCP get exposure per macro, approval per run, a rate limit and a trace for each agent.
What you keep. A palette on ⌥Space with quicklinks, snippets, clipboard history, a calculator, menu items and system commands. Its script commands and quicklinks import, and so do its snippets.
What you gain. No subscription, and your own Anthropic key costs nothing extra. You get hotkey macros with conditions and gestures. Guardrails and traces are new too. Window management stays in Raycast or Rectangle; I left it out on purpose.
What you keep. Your keywords, web searches and snippets import as macros with palette keywords, so what you type in Alfred works in ⌥Space. Alfred workflows come across too.
What you gain. Macros with conditions and a trace, element clicks and guardrails. It also has the iPhone and Watch apps and agents over MCP.
This is three years at each app’s public price. Switchboard is $59 for the first year of updates and then $29 a year, only if you want the new versions.
| Price | Three years | |
|---|---|---|
| Switchboard, buy once | $59, then $29 a year for new versions | $117 |
| Switchboard, Everything | $12 a month, AI included | $432 |
| Keyboard Maestro | $36 once | $36 |
| BetterTouchTool | $25 lifetime | $25 |
| Raycast Pro | $10 a month | $288 |
| Alfred | £34 Powerpack | $45 |
Raycast is the Raycast Pro plan, and I converted Alfred at about $1.33 to the pound. The Everything plan is $12 a month, $144 a year. It includes the AI allowance that the other apps charge for separately.
Coming soon See pricing