{"slug": "show-hn-snippety-a-native-text-expander-for-mac-and-iphone", "title": "Show HN: Snippety – a native text expander for Mac and iPhone", "summary": "Snippety, a native text expander for Mac and iPhone, launches with a templating engine that supports conditional blocks, live dates, shell scripts, and AI content, offering a one-time purchase option. The app, built with native technologies and no subscription requirement, includes 20 smart placeholders and features like a CLI, Apple Shortcuts integration, and a full iOS keyboard, with data staying on-device or in iCloud.", "body_md": "Type a keyword and watch it expand into full text, fill-in forms, conditional logic, live dates, shell scripts, and AI content. System-wide, in every app.\n\nMost text expanders paste static text. Snippety runs a real templating engine, so one snippet adapts to every situation.\n\n```\nHi {@text|Name@},\n\nThanks for reaching out about your {@selectable|Plan|Free;Premium@} plan.\n\n{@if|Plan == Premium@}\nPriority support. We'll reply today.\n{@else@}\nWe'll reply by {@calculated-date|+3d|dd.MM.yyyy|English@}.\n{@endif@}\nHi Alex,\n\nThanks for reaching out about your Premium plan.\n\nPriority support. We'll reply today.\n```\n\nPick `Free`\n\ninstead and the same snippet writes the fallback line, with the date\ncalculated on the spot. No second snippet to maintain.\n\nType one of these keywords in the box below and watch it expand instantly, just like Snippety does system-wide.\n\n`;due`\n\ncalculates a real date. `;reply`\n\nasks for values and picks its own wording.\nThat's a conditional block, and no other Mac text expander has one.\n\nDeeper than the rest, without the subscription or the account.\n\n20 smart placeholders and **conditional blocks that no competitor\noffers**. One snippet handles what other apps need five for.\n[See the full comparison →](/compare)\n\nStart free. Then a low monthly plan or a one-time purchase with lifetime updates. No forced subscriptions, no hidden fees.\n\nBuilt with native technologies. No web views, no Electron. Fast, lightweight, and truly native macOS & iOS app.\n\nRun shell scripts inside snippets, drive the app from a snippety CLI, or wire it into Apple Shortcuts and Siri. Nothing else in this category does all three.\n\nGenerate, translate, and rewrite from inside a template or the editor. Use your own model, including a local one, so nothing leaves your Mac.\n\nA full-featured iOS app with a custom keyboard, so you can expand snippets wherever you type, not a stripped-down viewer for your Mac library.\n\nNo sign-up, no email, no login. Everything stays on your device or in your own iCloud, so your snippets never touch our servers.\n\nPick from 250 built-in themes with fully configurable colors, so Snippety looks exactly the way you want.\n\nTrusted for over 6 years, updated constantly for the latest macOS and iOS releases, and backed by fast, direct support from the developer.\n\nEvery text expander expands text. These are the things most of them simply don't do.\n\n| Feature | Snippety | TextExpander | Typinator | Raycast |\n|---|---|---|---|---|\n| Conditional blocks | ||||\n| Shortcuts & Siri actions | ||||\n| Command-line interface | ||||\n| Run shell scripts in snippets | Built-in scripting | |||\n| Syntax highlighting for code | 50+ languages | |||\n| One-time purchase option | Pro Lifetime | macOS only no major upgrades |\n\nAlready using one of them? See the [Migration guide](/help/migration).\n\nSee Snippety in action through short videos\n\nSnippety allows you to create smart templates with customizable placeholders. Works in every text field - whether it's a browser, terminal, or application.\n\nUse conditional blocks to create dynamic templates that adapt based on your input.\n\nType a keyword like `:email`\n\nand watch it expand instantly. Snippety's text expander lets you boost your productivity without taking your hands off the keyboard.\n\nSimulate key presses to navigate forms, control apps, or perform complex sequences of actions while using snippets.\n\nEasily share and build collections of snippets with your co-workers and friends. Everything securely synced via iCloud, without any third-party servers.\n\nSnippety Keyboard lets you access your snippets wherever you type, everything seamlessly synced via iCloud. Expand snippets by typing keywords or browsing your collections.\n\nSnippety is a feature-rich text expander designed to save you time every day.\n\nClick below to learn more.\n\nOne snippet, many outcomes. Show a priority line for Premium customers and a standard one for everyone else, decided as the snippet expands. No other Mac expander does this.\n\n20 built-in placeholders: fill-in fields, dropdowns, calculated dates, clipboard and file contents, references to other snippets, all filled in as you expand.\n\nApp Rules show only your code snippets in your IDE and only your email ones in Mail, so the right library is always in front of you.\n\nStore code the way you write it, highlighted across 50+ languages. The only expander in this comparison that does.\n\nA snippety command that expands, searches, creates, and edits from the terminal. Pipe a snippet into a commit message, or bind one to any hotkey.\n\n20+ native Shortcuts actions, so your snippets can trigger, and be triggered by, anything else on your Mac. Run them from Spotlight, the menu bar, or Siri.\n\nRun a shell script mid-snippet and drop its output straight in. Format the selected JSON with jq, pull data from an API, or simulate keystrokes to fill a form.\n\nWorks in every text field. Press ⌘⇧Space and access your snippets from anywhere.\n\nYour library follows you to every Apple device through your own iCloud, with no third-party server in the middle.\n\nShare snippets with your team or friends securely via iCloud. All of this with no subscriptions or hidden fees!\n\nWrite in HTML, RTF, or Markdown and preview it before it lands, so formatted email replies stay formatted.\n\nPick what best fits your style and tweak it if needed. Choose from 250 built-in themes.\n\nWorks great on iPhone, iPad, and Mac.\n\nOne App Store purchase unlocks the app on all your devices with the same Apple ID.\n\nEverything you build on the Mac is already on your iPhone and iPad. The Snippety Keyboard expands your\nsnippets wherever you type, without opening the app, and it runs the very same templating engine: the same\n[20 placeholders](/help/category/placeholders), the same fill-in forms, the same conditional\nblocks. It all travels through your own iCloud, so there is nothing to set up and no account to create.\n\n★★★★★\n**4.8** from 1141 App Store ratings.\n\n\"It's been a while since I've fell in love with an app so quickly, but Snippety did. It's a little different than what I'm use to, but the power and convenience made it worth to me. After just one week I find myself using this little app a lot and in new ways all the time. Keep up the great work!\"\n\n\"I had AI do some research for me on the best text expander option. I wanted pay once, not subscription. I wanted fast, Mac native and good reviews. I wanted keywords with triggers and/or hotkeys. I wanted clean, simple and without lots of bloat. AI recommended Snippety and it couldn’t be better.\"\n\n\"Snippety is such a hidden gem. I’ve used it every day for the past 3 years. Calendar booking links, email snippets, chunks of code - all of it is instantly accessible. Love this app!\"\n\n\"Really enjoying integrating Snippety into my daily workflow. It hits the sweet spot between simplicity, ease of use, and added power. Can't recommend this enough!\"\n\n\"I'm a copywriter and salesman and everything I do is frameworked and structured. This app makes life so easy and the fact its on my computer, phone and tablet synched is awesome because I can get things done much faster\"\n\n\"Absolute No. 1 little helper, available across iPhone, iPad and MacOS, synced via iCloud. My favorite tool when it comes to quickly note down some code snippet.\"\n\n\"This is really what I was looking for. I use it for many text snippets. Like standard customer service e-mails and other text snippets that I need every day. Before I had to select/copy/paste from a text file every day. Thanks to Snippety I really save a lot of time.\"\n\nJoin ~1,100 people who rated Snippety 4.8 on the App Store.\n\nStart free. Then pay monthly, or buy it once and own it.\n\nStill have questions? [Read the FAQ](/faq)", "url": "https://wpnews.pro/news/show-hn-snippety-a-native-text-expander-for-mac-and-iphone", "canonical_source": "https://snippety.app", "published_at": "2026-08-29 09:24:29+00:00", "updated_at": "2026-08-29 09:48:19.817531+00:00", "lang": "en", "topics": ["ai-products", "ai-tools"], "entities": ["Snippety", "TextExpander", "Typinator", "Raycast", "Apple Shortcuts", "Siri", "iCloud"], "alternates": {"html": "https://wpnews.pro/news/show-hn-snippety-a-native-text-expander-for-mac-and-iphone", "markdown": "https://wpnews.pro/news/show-hn-snippety-a-native-text-expander-for-mac-and-iphone.md", "text": "https://wpnews.pro/news/show-hn-snippety-a-native-text-expander-for-mac-and-iphone.txt", "jsonld": "https://wpnews.pro/news/show-hn-snippety-a-native-text-expander-for-mac-and-iphone.jsonld"}}