Alter: Context Aware AI for Productivity, Automation, and a LOT More
An AI assistant that works everywhere on your mac. Powerful workflows. This app has a crazy amount of potential.
Hey everyone!
This week, I wanted to switch things up a bit and focus on one AI app that I’ve wanted to talk about for a while: Alter.
You might have heard me mention Alter before. I’ve been using it on my Mac for several months now, so I figured it was time to share some thoughts. I spent most of last week organizing my notes + shooting & editing a video about it, which you’ll find below. The app itself has improved quite a bit since I started using it. In the beginning, it had a HUGE number of bugs—enough that I sometimes wondered if my decision to invest in it was the right one. But I must give credit where it’s due: the developers have been putting out updates every Friday, and the app keeps getting better. Now, it still has a lot of bugs… haha… but the ones I see now are manageable and not ultra-critical (at least for me). That’s why I felt better about sharing more about this now. The developers also pay a lot of attention to user feedback, which, as you know, is something I value a lot.
If you’ve followed me for a while, you know I try to keep my setup simple and stick with tools that actually stand out and do things well. I’ve been a big fan of Superwhisper for voice dictation and some AI assistant tasks, but lately—as I’ve mentioned in previous newsletter editions—the app’s moved in a direction I’m not thrilled about. Some features I relied on have disappeared or have become harder to use, which sent me on the hunt for alternatives on the AI assistance side of things. That’s how I found Alter.
I’d say that, maybe, what stands out the most to me about Alter is how it deals with context. Unlike some other apps that seem to include context awareness as an afterthought, Alter feels built for it and puts it at the center of how it assists users. You can pull in content from pretty much any app on your Mac, and it has some powerful automation possibilities that make it fit right into my workflow. It’s a blast to use together with Macrowhisper, for example.
So, Alter has a lot of potential, and it’s quickly become a go-to app for me. Yes, it isn’t perfect, but as I said, I only stick with tools that do things well. And in the case of Alter, I just haven't found any other app that can do half the things this one does as an AI assistant. It’s actually quite a bit revolutionary. I jumped on the lifetime deal after a few days with the trial—lifetime licenses for apps that offer AI like this are rare.
I hope you give it a shot. It’s super easy to get started—you can try it for free if you have your own API tokens, or take advantage of their trial (and you don’t even need to use your API tokens for that). I’ve got more content about Alter planned in the future too, and I’m looking forward to seeing how it grows and improves with upcoming competition.
If you’re thinking about trying the paid version, use the code “AFT” to get 10% off.
I’ll be back next week with more of my usual recap. Thanks for reading—and watching! —Robert
P. S. Something I forgot to mention in the video is that Alter can run totally with local models, for those concerned about privacy.
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