smcFanControl

SmcFanControl

smcFanControl is a free, open source fan control software for Macs. It allows you to monitor and control fan speeds to optimize cooling and noise.
smcFanControl image
fan mac temperature monitoring control

smcFanControl: Free Fan Control Software for Macs

smcFanControl is a free, open source fan control software for Macs. It allows you to monitor and control fan speeds to optimize cooling and noise.

What is SmcFanControl?

smcFanControl is an open source, fan control software designed specifically for Mac computers. It gives users more control over the internal fans to optimize cooling or reduce fan noise.

Some key features of smcFanControl include:

  • Real-time graphs showing current and historical fan speeds and temperatures from various sensors
  • Custom fan speed curves that ramp fan speeds up or down based on different temperature triggers
  • Creating custom fan presets that can be activated with hotkeys or automatically
  • Temperature-based alarms that will trigger notifications, scripts, or other actions
  • Control over both built-in case fans and GPU/PCIe card fans (on supported hardware)
  • Lightweight software with a simple interface designed exclusively for macOS

By giving users more insight into thermal performance and greater control over cooling hardware, smcFanControl can help optimize the balance between cooling, temperature, fan noise, and power consumption. It's a useful utility for any Mac owner concerned about their machine running too hot or loud.

SmcFanControl Features

Features

  1. Monitor fan speeds
  2. Control fan speeds manually or automatically
  3. Set custom fan speed thresholds
  4. Temperature sensors monitoring
  5. Notifications when temperature or fan thresholds are reached

Pricing

  • Open Source

Pros

Free and open source

Works on Intel and M1 Macs

Simple and easy to use interface

Allows optimizing fan noise vs cooling

Cons

Limited to controlling fans only

Requires manually starting on login

No official support


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