Push Deck

64 pads. Zero Ableton Live. Plenty of fun.

Your Push 2, your desk, your rules.

Plug in a Push 2 and it becomes a colourful controller for whatever you are doing, with a screen that shows what matters.

Get Push DeckView on GitHub
Profile settings for Claude Code, the active profile on the Push
The menu bar panel: display and pad brightness, live Claude usage

The app

A replica of your Push, in a window.

Everything you set up here lands on the real device straight away.

  • Click any control on the replica to set it up: pads, buttons, knobs.
  • Drag actions onto the Push: shortcuts, apps, links, text, shell commands.
  • Mirror the display live, or preview a profile before you switch.
  • Arrange widgets on the screen: clock, timers, usage, the player.
The Push Deck window: the Claude Code profile, a replica of the Push 2 and the controls inspector

Profiles

Switch app. The pads switch with you.

1Claude Code

A live session on the display, with its mascot and usage meters. Pads send the keys you use every day.

2Browser

The tab in front on your display. Pads open sites, switch tabs and run page shortcuts.

3ChatGPT / Codex

Usage at a glance and the shortcuts you reach for, the moment the app comes to the front.

Features

Pads that actually do things.

Profiles that follow your app

Pads, buttons and encoders run shortcuts, open apps and addresses, type text, or run Shortcuts and shell commands. The profile follows the app in front, or you pin one.

A live display

The 960×160 screen shows button labels, a grid of widgets (clock, timers, Claude and Codex usage, the browser's tab) and a media player with a visualizer.

A replica to edit on

A browser-style UI with a copy of your Push: click a pad to edit it, mirror the display, arrange widgets.

A menu bar app

Pin a profile, open the window, set brightness and turn the Push on or off, without opening anything.

Set up in minutes

First-run setup checks your Push, explains each macOS permission in plain words and offers a short tour.

Private by design

Runs on your Mac. No account, no cloud, no tracking. It listens on 127.0.0.1 only.

First-run setup, welcome step
First-run setup checks your Push and explains each permission.
The menu bar panel, three tabs
The menu bar: pin a profile, switch the player, set brightness.

Privacy

No account. No cloud. No peeking.

Push Deck runs on your Mac and listens on 127.0.0.1 only. No account, no cloud, no tracking.

One optional feature touches a login: live Claude usage reads the Claude desktop app's sign-in from the macOS Keychain, in memory only. It asks first and can be switched off at any time.

Install

Grab it. Plug in. Press a pad.

DownloadComing with the first release

Watch releases

The .dmg from GitHub Releases. Drag Push Deck to Applications.

HomebrewComing with the first release

brew install --cask arcept/tap/pushdeck

Tap coming with the first release.

One lineComing with the first release

curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/arcept/pushdeck/main/get.sh | bash

Checks the checksum. No security prompt.

From source

./install.sh

Works today. Clone the repo first.

Push Deck is signed ad hoc (no paid Apple Developer ID). A downloaded copy says “unidentified developer” once: right-click the app, choose Open, then Open. The one-line installer avoids this.

  • Apple Silicon Mac, macOS 13 or newer
  • An Ableton Push 2 on USB (not the original Push, not Push 3)
  • The music visualizer needs macOS 14.2
  • Chrome, Spotify and the Claude desktop app are optional