Outbound for Mac: releases

Outbound 1.0.10: Undo for every rule change, and no silent changes

Fri, 09 Oct 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Outbound 1.0.10 makes every change visible and reversible: a confirmation for each change you make, Undo for rule changes, alerts that lead to the rule they made, stricter checks on coding-agent answers, and less memory and CPU in the background.

New

Undo for rule changes: Review decisions, Keep All, Dismiss, Network Monitor verdicts, adding, editing, deleting and switching rules, import and Tidy. Edit › Undo or the banner’s Undo takes back exactly that change, never a rule something else made in the meantime.
A confirmation for every change: pausing, resuming, switching mode or profile and saving rules show a short banner in the window you are using. If the change is waiting for your approval or for the filter to confirm it, the banner says so instead of claiming success.
Alerts lead to their rule: an answered alert says “Allowed App → host.” with Show Rule, “Edit Rules…” sits beside the answer, and notification actions open the exact rule.

Improved

Answers from your coding agent are checked against what Outbound’s tools returned every time, and numbers hidden in rule ids, dates or port lists no longer count as confirmation. Closing a session ends every process the agent started.
AI apps’ change requests show their outcome after you approve or decline them.
One vocabulary: Allow and Block everywhere, and the Firewall menu uses the menu bar’s wording.
A tidier menu bar panel: consistent corners and type, quieter header buttons, and as many flags as the headline counts.
Less memory and CPU in the background: the closed menu bar panel releases its GPU texture, icon caches are bounded, and the connection log no longer scans every connection on each refresh.
Showing and hiding the sidebar and inspector animate smoothly.

Fixed

A refused change could look exactly like a successful one.
Review could report a decision as Allowed when nothing changed.
A site’s icon could briefly show another site’s logo.
Command-line tools show their name without build suffixes.
Settings › Updates explains when the updater is unavailable.

Outbound 1.0.9: Intelligence, a live world and your own coding agent

Fri, 09 Oct 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Outbound 1.0.9 brings everything built since 1.0.1: an Analytics overview written by Apple Intelligence, answers from the coding agent you already pay for, Outbound’s tools for AI apps over MCP, a live world map and globe, Highlights, and a lighter footprint in the background.

New

Settings › Intelligence: let the coding agent you already use (Claude Code, Codex, Gemini CLI, Cursor, GitHub Copilot, OpenCode, Grok and others) answer your questions on its own subscription, with no API key. It reads this Mac’s figures only through Outbound’s own tools, it can’t read files, run commands or change anything on its own, and each number in its answer is checked against what those tools returned.
Analytics opens with an overview written by Apple Intelligence on your Mac. You can choose your own cloud model instead, and Outbound shows exactly what it would send first.
AI apps can use Outbound through MCP (outboundctl mcp, with one-click install for supported apps). Rule changes they ask for wait for your approval in Outbound.
A live world: the Network Monitor map in 2D or 3D, a globe you can turn with real sunlight, city lights and country flags, a world in the menu bar and its panel, a notch island for a country’s first contact, a World widget and a Dock globe.
Highlights: a score and streak, awards, a passport of the countries your Mac has reached, a Year in Review and cards to share.
Labs in Settings switches each visual experiment on or off and tunes size, detail and smoothness, with a live cost meter.
Smart filters (AI services, ads, new today) and daily data limits per app.
Open Quickly (⇧⌘O) to jump to any section, app, rule or action; Undo for deleted rules; the Delete key, Escape and ⌥⌘I work as on other Mac apps.

Improved

Official icons for apps, command-line tools and sites, including Claude Code, Codex, Grok, Meta and Tailscale.
A simpler menu bar capsule: rates, the meter, Today and Blocked as separate counters, and the shield.
Lighter in the background: fewer wake-ups, coalesced updates and a lighter map, so Outbound uses less CPU and GPU while you work.
Reduce Motion, Reduce Transparency and Increase Contrast are respected across the map, globe and floating panels.

Fixed

A connection leak to macOS’s extension service that grew the longer Outbound ran.
An app selected in the Network Monitor no longer follows you into Overview, Analytics or Rules; a second click deselects it.
The status pill fits above the Assistant’s conversation list.

Outbound 1.0.1: A guided setup and macOS 27 directions

Thu, 08 Oct 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Outbound 1.0.1 redesigns setup: a guide sits beside System Settings while macOS needs a switch turned on, and every direction uses the names macOS 27 shows. Analytics now fits narrow windows.

New

Setup shows its steps in a sidebar, with live checks for the network filter, filtering and starting at login.
While macOS needs a switch turned on, a small guide sits beside the System Settings window and shows what to turn on. It ticks when the switch is on and brings you back to Outbound.
The welcome page shows the apps open on your Mac, and each protection mode shows a preview: the Ask alert, the Learn list and what Strict blocks.
When setup ends, a pointer shows where Outbound’s menu bar icon is.

Improved

Directions on macOS 27 use the names and places macOS 27 shows: the Network Extensions list, Background App Activity, Network › VPN & Filters and the exact titles of the alerts. Earlier macOS versions keep their own directions.
On macOS 27, the DNS settings button opens Network settings.

Fixed

Analytics in a narrow window: the date range no longer wraps, which had made the filter bar very tall and pushed the summary out of view.

Outbound 1.0: The first public release

Wed, 07 Oct 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Outbound 1.0 is the first version you can download. It brings a redesigned Network Monitor with exact bytes per destination, scoped search and charts you can select a time window on, alerts that name the app’s developer, help for when the network stops working, and licence keys, a rule manager and a health report.

New

The Network Monitor is redesigned in the native macOS style: a list with Sent, Received and Last Seen columns, live per-app traffic bars, and the map always shown beside the list, or above it in a narrow window.
Exact bytes per destination. When a connection closes, the filter records exactly how many bytes it sent and received, and the Network Monitor shows them under Sent and Received on each destination and domain row and in the inspector. Live per-app traffic still comes from sampling.
Search with scoped words: app:, host:, port:, proto:, country:, direction:incoming or direction:outgoing, rule:none or rule:any, and quoted values such as app:"Google Chrome". A menu in the search field inserts them.
Drag across a traffic chart to select a time window; the list and map then show only that window. Hover a column to read the time and rates. Charts work from the keyboard (arrow keys, Escape) and with VoiceOver: adjust to move through time, and use the actions to select from a point to now or clear the selection.
Alerts name the developer from the app’s Developer ID certificate, such as “Signed by Google LLC” or “From the Mac App Store”, say when a server belongs to the app’s own developer, and say “Outbound doesn’t recognise this server” when it doesn’t.
Choose the port in the alert: only this port, any port, or any port and protocol.
When an app ships an Internet Access Policy, the alert quotes the developer’s stated purpose and what happens if you deny. This applies only to apps signed by a developer team or Apple.
VoiceOver announces each alert, and an optional sound plays when an alert appears (Settings).
Help › Network Not Working? shows Outbound’s state with Pause for 15 Minutes and Turn Off, the blocks of the last 30 minutes with one-click Allow, other network filters and VPNs that macOS reports, and a note about iCloud Private Relay.
Help › Report a Problem: describe the problem and, if you choose, include diagnostics (versions, Mac model, macOS, Outbound’s mode and status, rule counts and open problem codes; no sites, addresses or app names). The last 30 minutes of Outbound’s own log, which can name sites, is added only if you tick it. You see exactly what will be sent before sending, or you can save it to a file instead. Reports go to outboundfirewall.com over HTTPS and are kept only to fix the problem; the site stores a salted hash of the sender’s network address to limit abuse, never the address itself.
The menu bar panel lists recent blocks with an Allow button, and has Network Not Working? and Report a Problem rows.
After a few days in Learn, Outbound suggests reviewing what it saw and switching to Ask, or you can choose Later.
Review can allow everything from verified developers in one step with Allow Verified Developers.
Priority rules in the rule editor, which win over other rules.
Licence keys. Outbound asks for the key from your purchase email when it first opens. Settings › Licence shows who the licence belongs to and moves it to another Mac. A Personal licence covers 2 Macs; a Family licence covers 5. A licence problem never cuts off your network: the filter keeps working as it was.
Rule manager window, with scopes, rule groups and their settings, and each rule’s details.
Right-click any app to Allow All Connections or Deny All Connections.
Analytics dashboard: traffic, apps, domains, countries, ports, a heatmap and newly seen apps. Connections that Outbound asked you about appear as their own series.
Health report, with an on-device summary on Macs that support Apple Intelligence. Outbound checks every half hour and notifies you at most once a day about a serious problem.
Command-line tools appear by name and icon, including Claude Code, Grok, Kiro CLI, opencode, Cursor Agent, Gemini CLI and Copilot, instead of a bare version number.
Remove Outbound in Settings › General removes the network filter, its System Settings entry and the background agent, and can delete your rules and history too.
A new app icon in the style of macOS 26, with dark, clear and tinted versions.
Menu bar add-ons: today’s data and the current mode beside the traffic meter.
Settings › Appearance: Automatic, Light or Dark, and a choice of window tints.

Improved

Traffic charts throughout the app are thin columns on a faint track: upload above the centre line in orange, download below it in blue, each half on its own scale.
On Macs with Apple Intelligence, the on-device assistant answers questions about this Mac’s network in plain language. Answers come with the records they used, shown as charts, a traffic timeline, a map or cards you can click to inspect; it highlights key records and suggests follow-up questions. Its numbers are checked against the connection records, and nothing leaves the Mac.
Learn never re-trusts a program whose pinned code changed: the replaced program is asked about like a new one, and is blocked if nobody answers.
Home shows a live traffic chart, Blocked today and the apps that need attention, and uses about a quarter of the CPU it did before.
When the health check finds high memory use, it offers Relaunch Outbound and Restart Background Agent buttons. Health checks again a minute after the Mac wakes.
One traffic sampler: the app shows the background agent’s samples instead of running a second one.
Notifications from the background agent show Outbound’s icon, and clicking one opens the place where you can act on it.
Security hardening: the app and the background agent verify the code signature of the filter they connect to; rule and settings files are opened without following symbolic links; CSV and history exports neutralise spreadsheet formulas; and a blocklist feed can’t shrink itself away gradually, because a refresh below 10% of the list’s largest size is refused.
One prompt per DNS server. Programs that look up names themselves, such as Node, Bun and opencode, used to ask again for every load-balancer name; their lookups now share one alert and one answer.
Saving a rule with large blocklists on is about 15 times faster: the check went from 7.5 seconds to 0.5 seconds with 100,000 blocklist entries.
A rule tied to one exact copy of a signed program follows that program’s updates once the filter has seen the new copy signed by the same developer team.
The menu bar meter lights segments from left to right, upload and download in their own colours, and its panel shows the last five minutes of traffic.
The window uses the Mac’s own backgrounds, sidebar and colours, with more contrast in light and dark.
Much lower CPU use while Outbound is open: map markers no longer animate without end, and All Rules opens about three times faster with 1,500 rules.

Fixed

Setup fits inside its window.
Analytics days start at local midnight in time zones with a half-hour offset, such as India.
The background agent registers itself again if it stops answering.
Menu bar settings (what it shows, colour, traffic colours) now change the menu bar.
Setup no longer waits forever when macOS does not answer the filter installation; it offers to try again.

Outbound 0.2: Development builds before 1.0

Tue, 06 Oct 2026 12:00:00 GMT

The 0.2 builds turned the first working filter into the app that became 1.0: a background agent that answers alerts with the window closed, the native alert, encrypted DNS, Settings in twelve tabs, Little Snitch rule import, snapshots before updates and the on-device assistant.

New

A background agent that shows alerts and keeps rules in force while the main window is closed.
A native connection alert that explains who the program is and where it is connecting before you answer.
Encrypted DNS for the whole Mac over DNS-over-HTTPS or DNS-over-TLS, with Quad9, Cloudflare, Google, NextDNS or your own server.
Import and export of Little Snitch .lsrules files and rule-group subscriptions.
Snapshots of rules and settings before each update, with Restore in Settings › General › Backup.
An on-device assistant that answers questions about your Mac’s traffic.
Icons and names for 712 websites and 228 command-line tools and system services.

Improved

Blocklists are stored compactly: 80,000 entries went from 64 MB to 2.2 MB, with an indexed matcher.
Much lower CPU use while the app sits idle, and a native toolbar in every window layout.
Settings grew to twelve tabs: General, Appearance, Alerts, Monitor, Notifications, Security, Trusted, Blocklists, Profiles, DNS, Updates and Advanced.

Fixed

Allow answers always take effect, and a decision about one app and one destination no longer asks for a password or Touch ID.
Switching from the compact window to the full window no longer crashes.
The window no longer overflows when the sidebar is dragged wider than its limit.

Outbound 0.1: The first working filter

Sun, 04 Oct 2026 12:00:00 GMT

The 0.1 builds laid down what every later version stands on: the rules engine, the network filter, connection alerts that hold a connection while you decide, the Network Monitor, blocklists, profiles, outboundctl and the MDM controls.

New

A rules engine for apps, hosts, domains, IP addresses and network ranges (IPv4 and IPv6), with a fixed order of precedence and rule lifetimes. International domain names are compared in one form, so münchen.de and xn--mnchen-3ya.de match the same rules.
A network filter that runs as a macOS system extension and decides each connection.
Connection alerts that hold the connection while you decide. If you do not answer, UDP is allowed after 8 seconds and TCP after 60 seconds, or blocked if you choose.
A rules editor, the Network Monitor, Settings, profiles and HTTPS blocklist subscriptions with optional SHA-256 pinning.
outboundctl for status, rules, blocklists and profiles from the command line.
For IT: a managed rule feed over pinned HTTPS that refreshes every six hours, JSON Lines audit export to a folder your SIEM reads, and sample MDM profiles.
A daily audit log in JSON Lines, kept for 30 days.

Fixed

A crash on first launch when the filter was not running yet.