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UsageBar – Claude Code and Codex rate limits in the macOS menu bar

Developer idark7 released UsageBar, a native Swift macOS menu bar app that displays live 5-hour and weekly rate-limit usage for Anthropic's Claude Code and OpenAI's Codex, with notifications at 80% and 95% and a 24-hour usage sparkline. UsageBar reads Claude usage from the desktop app's plan-usage-history.json file sampled every ~15 minutes, from a claude_feed.json status line hook, or as a fallback from api.anthropic.com/api/oauth/usage using the Claude Code OAuth token, and reads Codex rate_limits entries from ~/.codex/sessions/**/*.jsonl. The app installs via 'brew install idark7/tap/usagebar' or a UsageBar-x.y.z.dmg release, and until it is notarized macOS requires a one-time right-click Open to launch it.

read2 min views6 publishedSep 21, 2026
UsageBar – Claude Code and Codex rate limits in the macOS menu bar
Image: Michielbdejong (auto-discovered)

Claude Code + Codex limits in your macOS menu bar. Never hit the 5‑hour wall by surprise again.

  • Live 5‑hour and weekly usage for Claude Code andCodex , colour‑coded green / yellow / red
  • Zero setup — if you use the Claude desktop app, it just works. No login, no API token.
  • Native notifications at 80 % and 95 %, and when a window resets
  • 24h sparkline of your Claude usage
  • Three menu bar styles: two‑line pill, compact C89 X100 , or gauge rings
  • Countdown to reset in the menu bar when you're nearly out
  • Show % remaining (default) or % used
  • Click a row to open the provider's usage page
  • Launch at login, configurable auto‑refresh, single native Swift binary (no Python, no Electron)
brew install idark7/tap/usagebar

or download the latest UsageBar-x.y.z.dmg from Releases, drag to Applications.

Until the app is notarized, macOS will say it "can't be opened". Right‑click the app → Open once, or allow it under System Settings → Privacy & Security.

Or build it yourself (needs Xcode command line tools):

./build.sh            # → build/UsageBar.app and build/UsageBar-<version>.dmg
Provider Source Needs
Claude ~/Library/Application Support/Claude/plan-usage-history.json , sampled every ~15 min by the Claude desktop app Claude app installed and signed in
Claude claude_feed.json written by the optional Claude Code status line hook (adds exact reset times) see below
Claude api.anthropic.com/api/oauth/usage with the Claude Code OAuth token fallback only
Codex rate_limits entries in~/.codex/sessions/**/*.jsonl Codex CLI

Whichever local source is freshest wins. When only the desktop‑app sample is available, the 5‑hour reset time is estimated from when the window started (shown as "≈").

Add the status line hook to ~/.claude/settings.json:

"statusLine": {
  "type": "command",
  "command": "/usr/bin/python3 \"/path/to/UsageBar/usagebar_statusline.py\""
}

It also gives you a Opus | 5h 11% | wk 26% | project status line in the terminal.

Tag vX.Y.Z and push; the GitHub Action builds a universal DMG and attaches it to the release. UsageBar --snapshot out.png renders the dropdown for docs. Add MACOS_CERT_P12, MACOS_CERT_PASSWORD, MACOS_SIGN_ID, APPLE_ID, APPLE_TEAM_ID, APPLE_APP_PASSWORD secrets to get Developer ID signing + notarization.

MIT

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