Questions people ask first
Including the ones with awkward answers. If something here isn't clear, email support@ghostbar.app.
- Does Ghostbar really stay hidden while I share my screen?
- Ghostbar asks macOS to exclude its overlay window from screen capture, which is the same mechanism password managers use. In practice that means it does not appear in Zoom, Google Meet, Microsoft Teams, or other apps that capture through the standard OS APIs. It is best-effort, not a guarantee: a camera pointed at your screen, a hardware capture device, or some remote-desktop and recording tools can still see it. Treat it as designed to stay out of a normal screen share, not as something that cannot be seen under any circumstances.
- Do you record or store my calls?
- No. Audio is transcribed so the model can use it and is not retained as a recording. Screenshots are sent only when you explicitly trigger Analyze Screen, and are used to answer that one question. We store your account, your billing status, and token usage counts — not the contents of your conversations.
- Where does my audio and screen data actually go?
- To Ghostbar's API, which forwards the request to the model provider (OpenAI or Anthropic, depending on the model you pick) and streams the answer back. Nothing is sent anywhere until you ask a question or start a transcript.
- Do I need an account to download it?
- Yes — a free account with a verified email. It takes about a minute, and the desktop app needs you signed in anyway, so doing it first means the install finishes ready to use. No card required to download or to run the free trial.
- Is it free?
- There is a free 15-minute trial session on every new account, with no card required. After that you can buy a single day for a one-off price, or take a monthly plan. Pricing is shown in INR or USD depending on where you are.
- Which computers does it run on?
- macOS, on both Apple Silicon and Intel. Windows downloads are paused for now — see the next question. There is no Linux build and no mobile app: the overlay depends on desktop windowing APIs that phones do not expose.
- Why does my Mac say Ghostbar is damaged or from an unidentified developer?
- Current builds are not yet notarized by Apple, so Gatekeeper asks you to confirm the first time you open the app. It is a trust prompt, not a virus warning. The one-command Terminal install skips it entirely, because files fetched with curl are not flagged with quarantine. The install guide walks through both routes.
- Do you support Windows?
- Not at the moment. Ghostbar is built by one person on a Mac, with no Windows machine to test on, which meant Windows releases were checked by reading the code rather than by actually using the app. That is not good enough, so Windows downloads are paused at version 1.0.16 while the Mac app gets the attention. If you already installed Ghostbar on Windows it keeps working and stays on 1.0.16 — nothing is uninstalled and you are not signed out. Windows will come back when it can be tested properly.
- Which AI models can I use?
- A fast tier and a smart tier, backed by current OpenAI and Anthropic models. Which models you can reach depends on your plan; the pricing page lists exactly what each tier includes.
- Can I use this in a job interview?
- That is between you and whoever is interviewing you. Plenty of employers and proctored assessments prohibit outside assistance, and using Ghostbar there may breach their rules. We built it as an assistant for meetings, calls, and your own work — check the rules that apply to you before using it in an assessed setting.