Sweep vs OnyX: Which One Do You Actually Need?

OnyX has been a free Mac maintenance utility since 2003. It’s made by Titanium Software in France, it’s beautifully unfussy in its way, and a generation of Mac power users swear by it. Sweep is a newer paid app aimed at a different audience. So which do you actually need? Honest answer below.

What OnyX actually is

OnyX is a free GUI front-end for macOS’s built-in maintenance commands. The cron jobs that run weekly to clean logs and rotate files? OnyX runs them on demand. The cache rebuild commands you’d otherwise type into Terminal? OnyX gives them a checkbox. Spotlight rebuild, font cache rebuild, LaunchServices reset, dock reset — they’re all in there.

It’s developed by one guy (Joël Barrière) who has maintained it for over 20 years. It’s free, it’s notarized, and there’s a separate version of OnyX for each version of macOS. The macOS 14 Sonoma version is what runs on most current Macs.

What Sweep is

Sweep is a Mac cleaner with an uninstaller and privacy tools. Caches, logs, language files, downloads, app leftovers, RAM freeing, permission auditing. Designed for people who want to clean their Mac without typing commands or remembering which checkbox does what.

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Feature comparison

These are not the same product. OnyX wraps Terminal commands. Sweep curates a cleanup list and adds tools OnyX doesn’t have.

Pricing

OnyX is free. No trial, no upsell, no telemetry. Joël Barrière accepts donations. That’s the deal.

Sweep has a free tier and paid plans (monthly, yearly, one-time, 1 Mac or 5 Macs). One-time license includes free updates forever.

If price is the deciding factor, OnyX wins. If features beyond cache cleaning matter, Sweep covers more ground.

Where OnyX genuinely wins

Giving credit:

• Free. Twenty-plus years of free updates. Hard to beat.
• Maintenance scripts. Runs the daily/weekly/monthly cron jobs that ship with macOS but sometimes don’t fire if your Mac sleeps through 3 AM.
• Cache rebuild specifically. Spotlight, font, LaunchServices — OnyX nukes and rebuilds them properly. This is genuinely useful when those subsystems get confused.
• System tweaks. Want to disable Dashboard, force show hidden files in Finder, change the screenshot folder, disable Safari swipe gestures? OnyX has a checkbox for all of it.
• No internet required. Once installed it’s fully offline. Some people care about this a lot.

If you’re a power user and you want the macOS equivalent of running the right Terminal commands without remembering them, OnyX is excellent.

Where Sweep wins

• App uninstaller. OnyX doesn’t do this. Sweep finds leftover files in ~/Library/Application Support, ~/Library/Caches, ~/Library/Preferences, etc.
• Privacy auditing. Not in OnyX. Sweep audits camera, mic, full disk, contacts, location permissions in one pane.
• Preview before delete. OnyX runs commands; you trust it. Sweep shows the file list every time.
• Easier for non-technical users. OnyX’s UI is dense and assumes knowledge. Sweep is built for “I just want my Mac cleaned.”
• RAM and processes. Sweep can free inactive RAM and pause runaway processes; OnyX doesn’t touch this.

The “Sweep is just OnyX with a coat of paint” argument

I’ve seen this take and want to address it honestly.

It’s wrong, but you can see why someone would think it. They’re both “Mac utility” apps and they share some cache-cleaning territory. But the actual feature lists overlap maybe 15%. Sweep doesn’t run maintenance scripts. OnyX doesn’t uninstall apps or audit permissions. They’re aimed at different problems.

A more accurate comparison: OnyX is the closest thing macOS has to “the right Terminal commands in one place.” Sweep is a cleaner with an uninstaller and privacy tools. If you just want cache cleaning and you’re comfortable with checklists, OnyX gives you that for free. If you want the broader cleaner experience, Sweep is what you’d reach for.

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OnyX’s real downside: the UI

Being honest: OnyX’s interface looks like a Mac utility from 2008. Dense tabs, dense checklists, terminology that assumes you know what “LaunchServices” is. For Joël’s audience, this is fine. For most Mac users, it’s intimidating.

If you’ve ever opened OnyX, scrolled through the Maintenance tab, and felt unsure whether to tick “Daily,” “Weekly,” “Monthly,” or all three — you’re not alone. Sweep, by contrast, runs a scan and tells you “you have 1.2 GB of safe-to-remove cache files.” Different audience.

When to use OnyX

• You’re a power user who wants to rebuild Spotlight after it goes wonky
• Your Mac is misbehaving and you want to run the maintenance scripts manually
• You want to tweak hidden macOS settings without typing defaults write commands
• You don’t want to spend money on a Mac utility ever

When to use Sweep

• You want a cleaner that handles caches, app uninstall, and privacy in one app
• You’d rather see a preview list than a checklist
• You want the privacy permission audit
• The “rebuild Spotlight” features wouldn’t make sense to you and you don’t want to learn

Bottom line

OnyX is the free, technical option. Sweep is the friendly, broader option with features OnyX doesn’t have. Neither is the right answer for everyone, and a fair number of users run both.

If you’re choosing one: get OnyX if you’re technical and you mainly want maintenance scripts and cache rebuilds. Get Sweep if you want a cleaner, an uninstaller, and a privacy audit in one calm interface.

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