I’ve experienced the frustration of having my Mac shut down unexpectedly during an important video call because I didn’t notice the battery was running low. The default macOS battery warnings are easy to miss when you’re deep in work, and by the time you notice that critical battery alert, it’s often too late to gracefully end a meeting or save your work.
Plug That In addresses this problem with a straightforward approach. This lightweight utility sits in your menu bar and delivers highly visible battery alerts before your MacBook reaches critical power levels. What makes it different from macOS’s built-in warnings is the customizable threshold system and the floating notification style that actively follows your cursor at 60 frames per second, making it nearly impossible to ignore.
You can set battery alerts at 30%, 25%, 20%, 15%, 10%, or 5%, and configure notification durations from 1 to 10 seconds. For situations where you need persistent reminders, there’s a “reminder mode” that displays alerts for 15, 30, or 60 seconds with optional sound alerts every 5 seconds. I appreciate that these extended notifications help when you’re in the middle of something and can’t immediately plug in.
The app includes smart Do Not Disturb functionality that respects your focus time. It automatically detects when your microphone, camera, or audio/video playback is active and suppresses alerts accordingly. This prevents embarrassing notification interruptions during presentations or calls, while still keeping the alerts visible in your menu bar.
Plug That In supports light and dark themes with fixed colors designed for maximum visibility. The developer has also included multi-language support for English, Chinese, Japanese, Spanish, German, and French. At just 1.6 MB, it has minimal impact on system resources.
The app requires macOS 14.6 or later and costs $0.99 on the Mac App Store. The developer maintains a strict privacy policy with no data collection. For less than a dollar, it’s a practical solution to prevent the productivity disruption and potential data loss that comes with unexpected battery depletion during critical work sessions.
