xdr-boost

Free and open-source XDR brightness booster for MacBook Pro. Like Vivid, but free.

Unlocks the full brightness of your Liquid Retina XDR display beyond the standard SDR limit. Your MacBook Pro can go up to 1600 nits — this tool lets you use it.

Features

• Boosts screen brightness beyond the standard 500 nit SDR limit using XDR hardware
• No white tint or washed-out colors — uses multiply compositing to preserve colors perfectly
• Menu bar icon with brightness presets (1.5x, 2.0x, 3.0x, 4.0x)
• Global keyboard shortcut (Cmd+Shift+B) to toggle from anywhere
• Survives sleep/wake, lid close/open, and lock/unlock — brightness auto-restores
• Starts with XDR off — rebooting always gives you a normal screen
• Emergency kill switch (xdr-boost --kill) if anything goes wrong
• Single binary, no dependencies, ~250 lines of Swift
• Launch agent for auto-start on login

How it works

MacBook Pro displays can output up to 1600 nits, but macOS caps regular desktop content at ~500 nits. The extra brightness is reserved for HDR content.

xdr-boost creates an invisible Metal overlay using multiply compositing with EDR (Extended Dynamic Range) values above 1.0. This triggers the display hardware to boost its backlight, making everything brighter while preserving colors perfectly — no white tint, no washed-out look.

Requirements

• MacBook Pro with Liquid Retina XDR display (M1 Pro/Max or later)
• macOS 12.0+

Install

git clone https://github.com/levelsio/xdr-boost.git
cd xdr-boost
make build

The binary will be at .build/xdr-boost.

Install to PATH

sudo make install

Start on login

sudo make install
make launch-agent

Uninstall

make remove-agent
sudo make uninstall

Usage

# Run with menu bar icon (default 2x boost)
xdr-boost

# Run with custom boost level
xdr-boost 3.0

Click the ☀ icon in your menu bar to:

• Toggle XDR brightness on/off
• Choose brightness level (1.5x, 2.0x, 3.0x, 4.0x)
• Quit

Keyboard shortcut

Cmd+Shift+B — toggle XDR brightness on/off from anywhere, no need to find the menu bar icon.

Emergency kill

If something goes wrong and you can't see your screen:

# From terminal (even blind-type it)
xdr-boost --kill

# Or just
pkill xdr-boost

The app always starts with XDR off — you have to manually turn it on. So rebooting will always give you a normal screen.

Sleep, lid close, and lock screen

A common problem with XDR brightness apps is that closing your laptop or locking the screen kills the brightness boost, and it doesn't come back when you return. xdr-boost fixes this with a watchdog that automatically restores your brightness within a few seconds after:

• Closing and reopening the laptop lid
• Locking and unlocking the screen
• Sleep and wake
• Plugging/unplugging external displays

If you turned XDR on, it stays on — no matter what.

License

MIT