Launched this week
Bloop turns system audio or mic input into eight real-time shader skins - every frame reacts to what's actually playing. Keep it beside your work in the resizable Mini Player or send it to the menu bar. Drop in an MP3 playlist and export the whole thing as a finished video. Apple Silicon, notarized, no subscription. Two skins are free forever, and they're the full app, not a trial.
Bloop
I built Bloop because I kept wanting the old iTunes visualizer back — but one that could actually hand me a file at the end, instead of just being pretty while it played.
What it does: Bloop listens to your system audio or your mic and renders it in real time with eight shader skins. There's a separate, resizable Mini Player that can stay above other apps, a live visualizer in the menu bar, track info, and — the part I use most — you can drop in an MP3 playlist and export the whole thing as a video.
The part that took longest wasn't the audio, it was getting one skin to feel alive. I rebuilt the last one four times: flowing ink, then organic waves, then a spring-coupled ring of 256 points that pushes outward and relaxes back, then a pass to make it react to musical attacks instead of raw volume. At the end I renamed it, because I'd been calling it Black Hole and the name described the exact opposite of what was on screen — nothing gets pulled inward, the outline gets pushed out and trails where it's been. It's called Wake now. That detour is maybe 400 lines of the app and most of what I learned building it.
Three things that make it different from the visualizers I tried before building my own:
• Real-time shaders, not pre-rendered loops. Every frame responds to what's actually playing, and on steady rhythms an automatic BPM pulse quietly aligns the breathing and wobble.
• System audio AND mic, with automatic noise suppression and a sensitivity control — so it works for a room, not just a file.
• Video export. This is the reason people pay for it. If you put music online, you need something to put on screen next to it.
Being upfront about the limits:
• Apple Silicon only. No Intel Mac support.
• macOS only, no plans for Windows in the near term.
• It's a visualizer. If you wanted an audio editor, this isn't it.
Pricing, no subscription:
• Free — Glossy and Contour skins, forever, no account
• All Skins ($9.99) — all eight
• Creator ($19.99) — all eight plus video export
Two Macs per license. Signed, hardened, and notarized by Apple, so no right-click-to-open dance.
The free skins are the full app, not a trial. Grab it at bloooooop.com and see if it does anything for you before you think about paying.
I'll be around all day. One thing I'm genuinely curious about: which skin do you end up on? I have a theory it splits by what kind of music people listen to, and I'd like to be proven wrong.
@bloop_musicvisualizer
The Black Hole to Wake rename is the tell that you were actually looking at it, not just shipping it. Most people would have shipped Black Hole and let the namestop matching the effect. On your theory, I'd guess it's less about genre and more about whether someone's watching while they work or watching instead of working, calmer skins for the former, Wake for the latter. Congrats on the launch, this is the kind of detail that makes a visualizer feel considered instead of decorative.
Bloop
@alex_gidirim Thanks, Alex! You might be right about watching while working versus just watching. The same playlist could suit a different skin in each case. I'd be curious which one you settle on if you try it.
Apple TV version?
Bloop
@lance_recker Thanks, Lance! Bloop is Mac-only for now, but I'll consider an Apple TV version for a future release. Would you want it to run on Apple TV on its own, or would streaming it from a Mac work for your setup?
Cool, but I’d add different colors.
Bloop
@natalia_iankovych Thanks, Natalia! Would you prefer picking your own colors, or a few ready-made palettes to switch between?
Oh, this could be really interesting. Congrats on the launch!
Bloop
@heyitsirenechan Thanks, Irene! If you get a chance to try it with your usual playlist, I'd love to hear what you think.
Dial
The "renamed it because Black Hole was doing the opposite of the name" bit is a great detail - that's the kind of thing you only notice once you've stared at it for hours. Grabbing Glossy and Contour now since they're the full app and not a trial. To answer your question: I'd guess people gravitate toward the calmer skins for background/focus music and the more chaotic ones like Wake for anything with a hard beat, curious if that theory holds up once you have real usage data.
Bloop
@galdayan Thanks for giving it a try, Gal! That calmer-vs-busier split makes sense. I'm curious whether you end up switching with the music or just finding one skin you keep coming back to. Let me know which one sticks.