Anyone who regularly transacts on the Ethereum blockchain knows the frustration of paying unnecessarily high gas fees. I recently discovered Ethereum Gas Bar with Alert after watching transaction costs fluctuate wildly throughout the day, and it’s proven to be exactly the kind of straightforward monitoring tool I needed sitting in my menu bar.
The app displays three categories of current gas prices (low, average, and high) sourced directly from Etherscan, along with the current Ethereum price in both USD and BTC. What makes this particularly useful is the customizable alert system. You can set a threshold for gas prices, and the app will notify you when fees drop below your target. For anyone who doesn’t need to execute transactions immediately, this can save substantial money by timing operations during network quiet periods.
I’ve been using this on my Mac Mini M4 for about two weeks now, primarily to monitor gas prices before executing smart contract interactions. The menu bar display is customizable with prefix and suffix options, including emoji support if that’s your style. I appreciate that the developer keeps the interface minimal. You get the information you need without unnecessary complexity or feature bloat.
Performance has been solid, roughly 1% CPU usage and around 35MB of memory based on Activity Monitor. The app pulls data from Etherscan’s API, which updates frequently enough to be useful without hammering your system resources. One aspect worth noting is that the free version provides core functionality, while the developer offers optional in-app purchases ($4.99, $9.99, and $99.99 tiers) structured as voluntary support rather than feature locks.
The app requires macOS 10.13 or later and comes in at 34.4 MB. Version 1.03, released in August 2025, includes an API update that resolved some data fetching issues I experienced in the previous version. The developer, Jiho Ryu at Academica.kr, appears to maintain the app actively based on the changelog.
This app is specifically for active Ethereum users who care about transaction timing and cost optimization. If you’re just holding cryptocurrency without making transactions, this probably isn’t relevant to your workflow. But if you’re interacting with DeFi protocols, minting NFTs, or regularly moving assets on the Ethereum network, having gas price visibility at a glance is genuinely useful. The alert system means you can queue up transactions and wait for optimal execution windows rather than checking manually throughout the day.
According to the App Store listing, the app doesn’t collect any user data, which aligns with the privacy-conscious approach I prefer. It’s a focused tool that does one thing well without trying to become a comprehensive cryptocurrency dashboard.
