A calm, private AI therapist & life coach for macOS. SelfOS gets to know you, remembers across time, and keeps everything in encrypted files that live on your computer — powered by your own Claude API key.
🌱 Visit the website · ⬇️ Download for macOS · 🛠️ Build from source
Important
SelfOS is a wellness and self-help tool — it is not a medical device, not therapy in the clinical sense, and not a substitute for professional care. It does not diagnose or treat. If you are in crisis or may be a danger to yourself or others, contact local emergency services or a crisis line right away.
Most AI tools forget you the moment you close the tab. SelfOS is the opposite: a deeply personal companion for reflection and self-coaching that remembers, connects the dots, and gently moves you forward — across conversations, dreams, relationships, and time. And it does all of it privately: there is no SelfOS server and no account. Your inner life stays in files you own.
- 🗣️ Coaching sessions — a streaming, judgment-free AI coach grounded in who you actually are.
- 🌱 It gets to know you — a warm, guided onboarding builds a rich personal portrait that keeps itself up to date as life changes.
- 🧠 Living memory — confidence-rated insights organized by life-area that reconcile over time; you can edit, flag, or correct anything it learns.
- ✨ Proactive coaching — it follows up on your goals, spots patterns across sessions and dreams, and nudges next steps. Fully tunable, never naggy.
- 🧭 Guided exercises — a library of self-guided exercises informed by CBT, ACT, GROW and more, plus a smart "suggested for you".
- 🌙 Dreams + AI imagery — capture dreams in seconds, work through a guided analysis, track recurring patterns, and visualize any dream as private AI art.
- 🤝 Built for couples & households — multiple people and the relationships between them, with relationship-scoped privacy: "shared" means it can inform another person's coach, never that it's shown to them.
- 📋 Questionnaires & compatibility — send hand-written or AI-drafted questionnaires in-app or via a private zero-knowledge link, or run a two-person compatibility check.
- 💞 Relationship & intimacy tracking — a frictionless check-in and a partner dashboard (connection, desire, appreciation, conflict) — both-consent, never covert.
- 🔐 You hold the keys — encrypted at rest with a master key only your devices hold; recovery phrase, multi-device join, device revocation, and key rotation.
- 💸 Transparent cost control — bring your own Claude key with per-person and household budgets, prompt caching, and a usage view to keep spend visible.
→ See it all on the website.
SelfOS keeps everything in plain, encrypted files inside a folder you choose — on your Mac, or a synced folder like iCloud or Dropbox if you want it on more than one device. Nothing is uploaded to us or stored on a server.
The only things that ever leave your computer are:
- The messages you send to the Claude API when you choose to use an AI feature — using your own Claude API key, billed directly to your Anthropic account.
- A lightweight update check to GitHub so the app can tell you when a newer version exists. It sends no personal data, and you can turn it off in Settings → About.
There is no SelfOS in that picture. Your content stays yours.
-
Go to the Releases page and download the latest
SelfOS-x.y.z.dmg. -
Open the
.dmgand drag SelfOS into your Applications folder. -
First time you open it: because SelfOS isn't yet signed with an Apple Developer certificate, macOS blocks it — usually with "SelfOS is damaged and can't be opened" (this is the standard warning for unsigned apps; the app is not actually damaged). To allow it, open Terminal, run the one-time command below, then open SelfOS normally:
xattr -cr /Applications/SelfOS.app
You only need to do this once. (On older macOS you may instead see "unidentified developer", in which case right-click the app → Open → Open also works — the
xattrcommand fixes both.) -
On first launch, SelfOS helps you pick a vault folder (where your data lives) and add your own Claude API key for the AI features.
- The AI features call the Claude API using your key, which may incur cost on your Anthropic account. SelfOS includes budgets and a usage view to keep that in check.
- Choose your vault — a folder for your data (local, or a synced folder for multiple devices).
- Add your Claude key — SelfOS uses it directly; there's no middleman and no subscription to us.
- Tell it about you — a guided intake builds your portrait so the first session already gets you.
- Reflect & grow — talk, journal, dream, set goals; SelfOS remembers and checks back in.
SelfOS is in active development, built spec-first and slice by slice (see
docs/specs/). Today it ships for macOS (currently unsigned — see the Gatekeeper
note above). An iPhone companion that shares the same vault over iCloud Drive is in progress;
Windows and Linux are later phases.
Building from source, the architecture, the tech stack, the spec-driven workflow, and how releases
work are all in CONTRIBUTING.md. The full design is documented spec-by-spec in
docs/specs/.
An AI therapist & life coach for reflection and self-coaching — calm, private, and entirely yours.
Not medical software. If you are in crisis, contact local emergency services or a crisis line.