You say what matters, in your own words
A goal is a sentence you wrote, kept exactly as you wrote it. Margo puts her own reading of it underneath rather than in place of it, and editing it saves a new version rather than erasing the old one.
How it works
What Margo reads, what it recommends, and how you tell it when it is wrong.
Margo is a Mac app, written for macOS itself, with an iPhone companion. It reads only what you let it read, thinks about it through Margo’s own AI service, and then puts the decision in front of you instead of acting on its own.
The loop
Five steps, in order.
You connect what you want it to see
Your calendar and your task list, which Margo can read but never change; Gmail, if you want it; and on the iPhone, the places you have named and your Screen Time report. Every one of them is optional. Whatever you do not connect, Margo simply does not have — and it says so on screen instead of guessing.
It reads on a schedule, not only when you look
On your Mac, Margo also works to a timetable of its own: it gathers what has happened and works out what it means. That is why something is already waiting for you when you open it, instead of an empty box asking what you want.
It proposes; you decide
Anything Margo is unsure about waits in a short list you answer right there: accept, disagree, or not relevant. Margo does not change your calendar.
It records where it was wrong
Recommendations you turned down, time estimates that were wrong, promises that moved. The Review screen shows all of it, including how often you actually took Margo’s advice, because a tool that only remembers its successes can never be corrected.
Five screens
Each screen answers one question, and the app says which.
01Overview
Know what deserves attention now
One screen, one question. The largest thing on it is a single recommendation, with the reason underneath and the facts that reason came from — a deadline, a calendar entry, how long this kind of work has taken you before. If something Margo reads has stopped sending anything new, it is marked late rather than quietly shown as though it were up to date.
Margo’s read 4 min old
Start the problem set now. Tonight is 40 minutes, not three hours.
Due tomorrow 09:00
Shift 20:00–23:00
Your last four took 100–130 min
02Plan
Plan against the hours you actually have
Three views of the same records: today, the week ahead, and everything you owe, wherever it came from. Fixed appointments, the hours you have protected and your own daily limit are taken out before any time is called free — so an empty afternoon is reported as an empty afternoon, not as four hours of work waiting to be poured into it. Editing in one view edits in all three, because there is a single record behind them.
Today 1h 50m free
Shift 20:00–23:00
Problem set 6 · 14:30–16:00
Reply to your project partner
Unscheduled is not the same as available. Dinner and the shift come out first.
03Goals
Make a goal something you can actually use
Your goals stay in the words you wrote them in, and Margo puts her own reading underneath rather than in place of them. Open one and you see what depends on it: the promises you made, the people involved, and the rules you asked Margo to keep applying — with the last thirty days of what actually got your attention beside it. Editing a goal saves a new version rather than erasing the old one, so the record of how your priorities changed survives the change.
01 Finish the degree30d · 41%
“I want to finish this semester without falling apart.”
Margo’s reading: held, narrowly. Coursework got attention on 19 of the last 30 days, and the two gaps were both weeks you worked three shifts.
A dotted baseline means no rule observed the goal that day. Unobserved is not zero.
04Insights
See what Margo noticed, and correct it
Overview shows the top of the list; Insights shows the whole of it, with Margo’s reasoning beside each item — what needs attention, what is turning into a pattern, and what you have already answered. Every item opens onto the evidence it was drawn from, and there is a box to write your correction in. Both screens read the same ranked list, so they cannot disagree about what matters.
Needs attention 4 open
“Finish the reading” has had no attention for 11 days.
Last worked on September 23
Three shifts and a deadline since
Bears on: finish the degree
Try itNot nowNot accurate
05Review
See the patterns, and correct the mistakes
One dial sets the period — from the last hour to the last month — and every panel on the screen answers for it. A panel appears only once there is something real to show in it, so what you see is a reading rather than a promise that figures will arrive later. Margo shows her own record too: how many suggestions she made, how many you took up, how many you called useful — and how many she never showed you at all, which are not suggestions you ignored.
focus / how long it held7D
Margo was wrong twice this week
Sleep, heart rate, phone location
On every screen
Ask Margo — type it, or say it
Margo herself is on every screen: in the centre of Overview, in a corner of the others, and one keystroke away (⌘J) wherever you are. She takes two kinds of sentence — a question, and something you simply want her to know. “I promised Dan the draft by Friday” becomes a commitment with a date on it, comes back to you when Friday is close, and is counted in the end as kept, moved or dropped.
Ask Margo ⌘J
Ask Margo…
Talk with MargoI promised Dan the draft by FridayWhat did I say I’d do this week?
Promise to Dan · draft
Kept 7 of 9 promises this month
Every picture here is a recreation of the app, filled with invented data.
A worked example
Watch it change its mind.
The whole loop over one made-up week. It is a script rather than a live AI, and it asks you for nothing.
Step 1 of 5 — The goal
You tell Margo what matters
Scripted example“I want to finish this semester without falling apart. Passing everything matters more than any single grade.”
Recorded as a goal, in your words. I will treat coursework deadlines as the thing that protects it, and I will tell you when something else starts eating into it.
Why this?
- Kept as written, not summarisedgoals
- Editing it saves a new version instead of overwriting this onewhere it came from
What you can do
Edit the sentenceChange how much it matters
01 / 05
Step 2 of 5 — The plan
Margo turns commitments into a plan that fits the week
Scripted exampleProblem set 6 is due tomorrow at 09:00. Today has about 90 free minutes before your shift; tonight has about 40. Start it this afternoon.
Why this?
- Due tomorrow 09:00coursework
- Shift 20:00–23:00, dinner 18:30calendar
- Your last four problem sets took 100–130 minutesyour own history
What you can do
AcceptI disagreeNot relevant
Step 3 of 5 — Things change
The day stops cooperating
Scripted example“My shift got moved forward. I am leaving at 16:00.”
Then this afternoon is about 35 minutes, not 90, and tonight is gone. The realistic version is one focused block now on the two questions that carry the most marks, and the rest at 07:00 tomorrow.
Why this?
- Shift moved to 16:00 — you told meyou
- Nothing on your calendar before 09:00 tomorrowcalendar
What you can do
Accept the smaller blockMove the deadline work
Step 4 of 5 — A correction
You correct her, and the correction sticks
Scripted example“I already did questions one and two on paper last night.”
Then you are most of the way through, and my read was wrong — I had no record of last night because paper leaves none. Updated: one 35-minute block finishes it, and tomorrow morning is free again.
Why this?
- Questions 1–2 complete — you told meyou
- I had no observation for last nightnothing observed
What you can do
AcceptCorrect this again
I never read a quiet evening as a lazy one. Work you do away from a screen leaves no record here, and a missing record is not evidence that nothing was done.
Step 5 of 5 — The review
At the end, what actually happened
Scripted exampleYou finished it. Two of the four sets this month ran over your estimate, both on the weeks you also worked three shifts. When a week has three shifts in it, I will plan coursework for the mornings.
Why this?
- Both overruns fell in three-shift weekscalendar
- One recommendation of mine was wrong this month, and is recorded as wrongadvice you took
What you can do
Keep this ruleDrop it
Four sets is a small number. This is a pattern I noticed in your records, not a fact about you.
What Margo needs from you
Two things. An AI subscription is not one of them, which is the part that surprises people.
A Mac
Margo is a native macOS app, and it starts there. It is built and run on Apple silicon; no Intel build has been produced. Margo is written for the Mac, and it starts there. The iPhone companion carries on from it once your Mac is set up.
A Margo Account
Download Margo and open it. It opens margo.global in your browser, where you continue with Google — that creates or links your Margo Account — and connect your Mac with one click. With a subscription your Mac is switched on automatically; a beta tester’s Mac is approved by the Margo team. On your iPhone you sign in with the same account. The AI is included: Margo reaches it through its own AI service and pays for it during the beta.
| Service | What Margo does with it | What it means for you |
|---|---|---|
| Margo’s AI service | Margo sends the parts of your records a question actually needs to Margo’s own AI service, which puts them to the AI it uses and returns the answer. Which model that is depends on your plan. | Included for invited beta testers and paid for by Margo, up to a set amount of use for each tester. You do not need an AI subscription of your own, and there is nothing to install. The service records the use itself — which model, how much text, what it cost, which version of the app — never the text you sent. |
There is nothing to install and no AI account to sign in to. If Margo’s AI service cannot be reached, Margo says so rather than guessing.
What it connects to
Your calendar and your task list, which Margo reads but never changes; Gmail, if you choose to; and on the iPhone, the places you have named and your Screen Time report. Each one is optional, and you connect it from inside the app. Google Drive is not part of this beta.
See everything Margo connects to
What works today, and how finished it is
Nothing here is described as finished unless it is. Everything marked shipped works today in the version invited testers install, and has not been through an approved public release. Every page on this site reads from this one list, so nothing can be played down in one place and oversold in another.
| Feature | What it is | Status |
|---|---|---|
| Overview | What matters now, on one screen: Margo’s reading of your day, the single next step worth taking, the reason behind it, and how much room the day actually has left. | Released |
| Plan | Today, the week ahead and everything you owe, in one place. Fixed events, protected hours and your own daily limit come out before anything is called free. | Released |
| Goals | Your goals as the sentences you wrote, Margo’s reading beneath each one, thirty days of the activity she has matched to it, and a short list of suggestions and out-of-date assumptions you answer right there. | Released |
| Insights | Everything Margo noticed, in order, with the working out beside each one: the fact, what she concluded from it, and what she suggests. Any of it can be corrected in place. | Released |
| Review | What happened over any period from the last hour to the last month, what you still owe, and where Margo was wrong. | Released |
| Asking Margo, on every screen | Margo is on every screen — the middle of Overview, the corner of the rest — and ⌘J reaches her from anywhere. Ask her something or tell her something, plus a scratchpad that stays where you left it. | Released |
| Talking to Margo | Tap her and speak. Margo hears when your turn has ended rather than waiting for a button, answers out loud, and leaves the microphone open so you can cut in. Spoken and typed turns are one conversation. | Released |
| Everything Margo says shows where it came from | Each thing Margo tells you records where it came from, and anything that has stopped reporting in is shown as late rather than presented as current. | Released |
| Correction changes what Margo believes | Disagreeing with Margo saves a new entry rather than editing the old one, so the record of what changed survives. | Released |
| Your records live on your Mac | Margo reads and writes a database and a journal inside your home folder. Only the part your iPhone needs is synced, through your Margo Account. | Released |
| Margo Account | Google, or email and password. One account signs in your Mac and your iPhone, so they belong together. | Released |
| iPhone companion | Continues on your iPhone what starts on your Mac. In private testing, installed for invited testers by the Margo team. | Released |
| Sync between Mac and iPhone | Through your Margo Account and Margo’s account service, which keeps the account, your devices and the synced records. | Released |
What Margo will not do
- It does not act on your behalf: it proposes, and you decide.
- It does not rewrite its own code or improve itself unattended.
- It does not treat a quiet day as proof of anything. Missing activity is missing activity, not evidence about you.
- It does not give medical, legal, financial or emergency advice, and it is not a substitute for a person who can.
- It does not read your screen. It reads what you tell it and the connections listed above, and each of those only after you have connected it.