Echo

Echo is a menu-bar app that remembers every song, podcast and video you play, across your apps and your browser, in one tidy history. Press the global shortcut from anywhere and a fast, keyboard-first overlay appears. Choose anything and it resumes at the exact spot you left off, and videos can come back in a floating picture-in-picture player that hovers over your work.

Native apps that publish to macOS Now Playing, including Spotify, Apple Music and Apple Podcasts, work out of the box. Add the free companion browser extension and Echo also remembers anything you play in your browser: YouTube, Spotify Web, SoundCloud, podcasts, and any tab with audio or video.

You only need the extension for media you play in your browser; native apps like Spotify, Apple Music and Apple Podcasts work without it. To set it up, open Echo's Settings, go to General, and click "Get Extension" next to the Browser row. It's free: the Chrome listing works in Chrome, Edge, Brave, Arc, Dia, Vivaldi and Opera, Firefox has its own listing, and Safari isn't supported yet. There's nothing to pair or configure. While the Echo app is running, the extension connects on its own, its toolbar icon shows a green dot, and the same Settings row switches to "Connected".

Echo works out of the box. macOS will ask once to let Echo control Spotify and Apple Music, which powers precise resume for those apps. Two permissions are optional and only for specific features: Accessibility lets Echo control Apple Podcasts and resume things in the background more reliably, and Screen Recording is used solely by "Hide Spotify & Music On Resume" to cover a tiny corner of the screen behind the hidden player window. Echo never records your screen. After granting either one, quit and reopen Echo.

Press Cmd-Shift-E from anywhere on your Mac (or click the three-bar icon in the menu bar) and Echo's overlay appears: what's playing now pinned at the top, then everything else, newest first. Just start typing to filter, use the arrow keys to move, and press Return to resume quietly in the background. Cmd-Return resumes and brings the app or tab to the front, and Esc closes the overlay. You can change any of these keys in Settings, under Shortcuts.

Yes. Echo turns on Launch At Login the first time it runs, because it can only remember what you play while it's running: if it didn't come back after a restart, your history would quietly stop. If you'd rather start it yourself, switch off Launch At Login in Settings, under General, and Echo will respect that choice permanently. It lives in the menu bar only, so it never adds a window or a Dock icon to your day.

Echo checks for updates automatically in the background about once an hour, and shortly after it launches, so you'll be offered new versions as they ship. To check right now, click the Echo icon in the menu bar and choose "Check for Updates...". Every update is included with your licence at no extra cost, and updates are signed and verified before they install.

Yes. While something plays, Echo quietly notes your position every few seconds, and it always keeps the furthest point you reached, so scrubbing back or an accidental restart never loses your place. Resume then returns you to that exact spot: YouTube videos reopen at the right second, Spotify and Apple Music jump to the exact track and position, and podcasts pick up mid-episode. If you finish something and later start it again from the top, Echo notices and lets it begin fresh.

Yes, Spotify is one of Echo's best-supported apps. With the desktop app, Echo remembers every track and resumes the exact song at the exact position, quietly in the background, without the Spotify window jumping in front of you. Spotify in a browser tab is remembered too, as one tidy entry that always shows your latest track. And if you pick a Spotify web item while the desktop app is installed, Echo is smart enough to hand playback to the app instead of opening a tab.

That's intentional. Re-picking a three-minute song almost always means "play this song", not "continue it from 1:47", so ordinary music starts from the top. Long-form listening is different: podcasts, videos, and any music longer than 20 minutes (DJ sets, mixes, ambient tracks, audiobooks) resume exactly where you left off, because that's the thing you most want to continue. So the short stuff behaves like a jukebox and the long stuff behaves like a bookmark, automatically.

With the browser extension installed, every YouTube video you watch for more than a few seconds joins your history, keyed to the video itself, so the same video opened from different links or tabs stays one entry. Press Return on it later and it comes back at the exact second, playing in Echo's own floating player, no tab required. Cmd-Return reopens the real YouTube tab instead. Videos that block embedding still work: Echo hands them to your browser's built-in floating player automatically.

Resume a video and it can float in a small window that stays on top while you work. Hover over the picture and it fades to a ghost so you can see and click whatever is behind it, without moving the window. A slim control bar gives you a scrubber, 10-second skips, play and pause, playback speed (1x, 1.5x and 2x), open-in-browser, and close. Choose which screen corner it lives in, and how far from the edge, in Settings under Playback. Ctrl-Option-P toggles it from anywhere.

Yes. Any browser video can play sound-only in the background, with no window at all, which is perfect for talks, podcasts on YouTube and music videos. Echo remembers how you last enjoyed each video, watching or just listening, and a plain Return repeats that choice. Option-Return flips it for a single play, and the watch toggle on the now-playing card (or Ctrl-Option-P) switches between watching and listening live, without interrupting playback. The default for first-time videos is in Settings, under Playback.

That's Echo's single-playback rule: when you start something new, whatever was already playing pauses, so two things never talk over each other. It works across everything, desktop apps and browser tabs alike, and it deliberately never pauses a live call: meeting sites like Google Meet, Zoom, Teams and Slack are always left alone. Spotify on desktop and Spotify in a tab count as one player, so they won't fight each other. Prefer to manage audio yourself? Turn it off in Settings, under Playback.

Moments are bookmarked spots inside whatever you're listening to or watching. Hear something worth coming back to? Press Ctrl-Option-M from anywhere and Echo saves the spot, wound back ten seconds so you get the run-up rather than the instant you pressed the key. A small confirmation appears on screen. Your Moments live in their own tab in the overlay (Cmd-6), each one jumps straight to its second, and you can add a note to remember why you saved it.

The Shelf is your "continue watching" list for the whole Mac: podcasts and videos you've genuinely started but haven't finished. Echo works this out from how far through you are, so nothing needs marking by hand. Things you're at least 80% through appear in their own "almost done" group, ideal for a quick finish, and anything untouched for three weeks quietly drops off so the Shelf never becomes a guilt pile. Find it in the overlay's scope bar, or press Cmd-5.

Two ways. Pin an item (Cmd-P) to float it to the top of your history, or Save it (Cmd-S) to add it to your Saved queue of things to start later (Cmd-7 to view). Both are permanently kept: even if you set Keep History to the last 7 days or the last 50 items in Settings, pinned and saved items are never pruned. Everything else ages out according to your Keep History choice, which defaults to keeping everything.

Yes. Select an item in the overlay, press Cmd-K to open its actions, and choose Send to Phone. Echo shows a QR code, generated entirely on your Mac, that links to the item anchored at your exact playback position. Point your phone's camera at it and the video or track opens right where you left off on the Mac. Nothing is uploaded anywhere; it's simply a link with your spot built in.

Yes, every shortcut in Echo is rebindable, from the global summon key (Cmd-Shift-E by default) down to the individual overlay keys for tabs, actions and navigation. Open Settings, choose Shortcuts, click a shortcut and press your new combination. Echo checks for clashes as you record and tells you if a key is already taken. Global shortcuts and letter keys need a modifier (Cmd, Option, Ctrl or Shift) so they can't collide with typing in the search box, and Reset All puts everything back to the defaults.

Echo is $9.99, a one-time purchase, with no subscription and no account. One licence covers up to three Macs and every future update is included. There is no time-limited trial; instead there is a 14-day money-back guarantee, so you can buy it, try it properly, and email support@theodorehq.com for a full refund if it is not for you. It needs macOS 13 or later.

Your key was shown right after checkout and emailed to you with your purchase receipt, so a quick search of your inbox for "Polar" or "Echo" usually finds it. If it's nowhere to be found, email support@theodorehq.com from the address you bought with and we'll look it up and get you back in, usually within a day. There's also a shortcut inside the app: Settings, Licence, "Lost Your Key?" opens that email for you.

Your licence covers up to three Macs, so often you can simply install Echo on the new machine and enter your key. If all three slots are used, free one first: on a Mac you no longer need, open Settings, go to Licence, and click Deactivate This Mac, then confirm. That releases the slot immediately. On the new Mac, download Echo from theodorehq.com/echo, enter your key, and you're back up and running with your settings fresh.

Yes. Echo itself is fully local, so capturing and resuming work with no connection at all. The only thing that needs the internet occasionally is your licence: Echo confirms it quietly in the background, and a Mac can stay offline for up to 7 days between checks. If you've been away longer than that, Echo asks you to connect once so it can verify the licence, then carries on as normal. Nothing about your listening history is involved in that check.

Three quick checks usually solve this. First, make sure the extension is installed and the Echo app is open: in Echo's Settings under General, the Browser row should say "Connected", and the extension's toolbar icon shows a green dot. Second, check the site: the extension watches the major media sites, including YouTube, Spotify, Apple Music, Tidal, SoundCloud, Vimeo, Twitch, Deezer and Amazon Music. Third, remember Echo only notes things after about 10 seconds of actual, audible playback, so muted clips and quick previews are skipped on purpose.

That message means the extension can't reach the Echo app right now. Open Echo (check for the three-bar icon in the menu bar) and the extension reconnects automatically within a few seconds, no pairing needed. If Echo is open but still not detected, make sure your licence is activated, since Echo only starts its browser connection once it's unlocked, and try quitting and reopening your browser once so it picks up the fresh connection. Keeping your browser up to date also helps: the most reliable connection method needs Chrome 144 or newer.

Echo is choosy on purpose, so your history stays meaningful. Things are only noted after about 10 seconds of continuous, audible play (adjustable in Settings, General, "Only Note After"), so skipped tracks and muted autoplay clips never appear. Messaging, mail, meetings and document sites (WhatsApp, Slack, Google Meet, Google Docs and friends) are always ignored, as are screen recorders. Also check that Pause Echo isn't switched on, and that the app or site isn't in your Never Record lists under Settings, Privacy & Permissions.

Echo saves your position every few seconds while something plays, and it always keeps the furthest point you genuinely reached, so a stray scrub backwards or an accidental restart can't erase your progress. If a resume seems off, play the item for a few seconds so a fresh position is written, then it will be exact from there. Two behaviours are deliberate: finishing something and starting it again from the top resets it so you can rewatch, and ordinary songs restart from the beginning by design, while podcasts, videos and long music continue mid-way.

Browsers only let a brand-new or long-idle tab start making sound while it's front and centre, a rule designed to stop pages autoplaying behind your back. So when a resume needs a fresh tab, Echo opens it in front just long enough to get it playing, then returns you to the tab and app you were in while the audio continues in the background. Granting Echo the Accessibility permission (Settings, Privacy & Permissions) makes these quiet resumes succeed more often. Videos resumed with plain Return normally use Echo's own player instead, which avoids tabs entirely.

Yes. Echo already tucks the player away moments after a quiet resume, but for complete invisibility turn on "Hide Spotify & Music On Resume" in Settings, under Playback. It needs two macOS permissions: Accessibility, to move the player's window out of sight, and Screen Recording, which is used only to copy the small strip of screen behind the parked window so it's perfectly covered. Nothing is ever recorded or sent anywhere. After granting both, quit and reopen Echo and resumes become fully seamless.

Apple Podcasts is the one app that offers no direct way for other apps to control it, so Echo presses its Play control for you through the Accessibility permission. Grant it in Echo's Settings, under Privacy & Permissions (or when macOS asks), then quit and reopen Echo. From then on, picking an episode resumes Podcasts quietly in the background, and Echo will even launch the app for you if it's closed. Without the permission, Echo still tries its best, but resume is much more reliable with it granted.

When a keyboard combination is already claimed by another app or by macOS itself, the system gives it to whoever registered first, so Echo's press never arrives. The fix is quick: open Settings, go to Shortcuts, click the shortcut and record a new combination. Echo validates it as you type and warns about clashes with its own keys. Combinations with two modifiers (like Cmd-Shift or Ctrl-Option) are rarely taken. If the overlay opens but a key inside it does nothing, check the same panel, since every overlay key is rebindable too.

Email support@theodorehq.com. A real person, not a bot, reads every message and usually replies within a day. Whether it is a question, a bug report, or an idea for Echo, we would love to hear from you. You can also report bugs, request features, and vote on ideas right here on the feedback board.

Completely. Everything Echo records stays on your Mac: there is no account, no cloud and no analytics. The browser extension only reads the title, artwork and playback position of tabs that are playing media, and passes them straight to the Echo app on your own Mac over a loopback connection (127.0.0.1) that never touches the internet. It never reads your browsing history or page content, and nothing is ever sent to us.

Everything you play stays on your Mac: history, artwork, Moments and listening sessions live in local files under your user library, and your licence key sits in the macOS Keychain. Echo has no analytics, no telemetry and no account. The only network traffic is: an occasional licence check with our payment provider (your key and your Mac's name, never your history), the hourly check for app updates, and fetching cover images over secure connections. Playing something naturally streams from that service, exactly as if you'd pressed play yourself.

Absolutely, you're in full control. In Settings, under Privacy & Permissions, add any app or website to the Never Record lists and Echo will ignore it completely. Sensitive places are already excluded for you: messaging, mail, meetings and document sites never enter your history. You can also pause all tracking with one switch (Settings, General, Pause Echo), remove any single item or a whole app's items from the overlay, clear everything, or cap how long history is kept. Deleting an item also removes its cached artwork from disk.

Not unless you ask it to. Diagnostic Logging is off by default. If you're troubleshooting something with us, you can turn it on in Settings, under Privacy & Permissions, and Echo keeps a local log you can export and attach to a support email yourself. Nothing is ever sent automatically, the file lives only on your Mac, and switching the toggle off deletes it immediately so nothing lingers.