MoniScale

A easy to use and simple MacOS Monitor UI Scaling solution!

What is MoniScale?

MoniScale lives in your menu bar and gives you a single slider per connected display. Drag it to pick any resolution — from your monitor's native modes all the way up to 4K — and MoniScale applies it instantly.

The Problem

macOS restricts the available scaled resolutions on external monitors to whatever the display natively advertises. If you own a 1080p or 1440p external monitor, you're stuck with a handful of low-quality scaled modes — no 2K rendering, no 4K, even if your Mac is more than capable of driving it.

Tools that fix this are either expensive, bloated with features you don't need, or require persistent system extensions.

The Solution

Under the hood, MoniScale uses macOS's private virtual display API to create a higher-resolution virtual framebuffer, then mirrors it onto your physical display. The GPU renders at the higher resolution; macOS downsamples to your panel. The result is noticeably sharper text and UI compared to a standard low-res scaled mode.

When you quit, MoniScale cleans up all virtual displays automatically. Nothing persists, nothing lingers.

Key Features

• Menu bar app — no Dock icon, no background services, no login items required
• Per-monitor slider — one control per connected external display, labelled with exact resolution
• Native + virtual modes — lists your monitor's real hardware modes alongside virtual above-native modes (up to 4K)
• HiDPI detection — marks HiDPI modes so you always know what you're selecting
• Instant apply — changes take effect on slider release with no confirmation dialogs
• Auto-refresh — detects display connect/disconnect events automatically
• Clean teardown — all virtual displays are removed when the app quits
• Zero bloat — ~300 lines of Swift, no third-party dependencies

Requirements

• macOS 26 or later
• An external display (built-in displays are excluded)
• Xcode 26+ to build from source

Installation

MoniScale is built from source. Clone the repo and open the Xcode project:

git clone https://github.com/Frostist/MoniScale.git
cd MoniScale
open MoniScale.xcodeproj

Build and run with Cmd+R. The app appears in your menu bar as a monitor icon.

Privacy

MoniScale does not collect data, make network requests, or read any files outside its own process. It only calls local display APIs.

License

MIT — see LICENSE.

Note: MoniScale uses private macOS display APIs. Apple does not document these APIs and may change them in future OS releases. The app is intended for personal use and is not suitable for App Store distribution.