v4.3.4

The previous release added a variety of new features including nits-based normalized brightness syncing, direct brightness upscaling for built-in XDR displays, HDR virtual screens, improved LG webOS support along with various fixes, performance and compatibility improvements.

This version is a minor service release with some bug-fixes and improvements.

macOS 27 Golden Gate beta users: please go to Settings > Application > Updates and enable both Receive pre-release updates and Receive internal pre-release updates, then use Check for Updates to get the latest build with full macOS 27 support!

Fixes, improvements

• Direct display brightness "Force EDR mode" option might cause heavy CPU usage and cause the app to hang after a longer sleep - #5441
• macOS 26.5 Shortcuts opens app Settings if there is an action from another app in the same Shortcut #5454
• Brightness nits in the OSD cannot be turned off without Pro - #5459
• Rare resolution slider crash (when resolutions list changes) - #5462
• Tools menu header upper corner rounding may fail in certain situations - #5433
• Prevent auto-hiding menu bar to hide while app menu is open - #5463
• Menu open/close tutorial stays forever if the menu bar icon is disabled in System Settings - #5453
• Glass OSD slider knob looks somewhat semi-transparent when not being dragged - #5460
• Menu "more options" chevron collapse animation missing - #5461
• Onboarding arrow animations are stuck upon first app open - #5465

Included Localizations

• British English, Chinese Simplified, Chinese Traditional, Dutch, French, German, Hungarian, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Norwegian Bokmål, Polish, Portuguese Brazil, Romanian, Russian, Slovenian, Spanish, Swedish, Turkish, Ukrainian, and Vietnamese.
• Contributors: @afkeceli, @AndryTi, @andrwmai, @BingoKingo, @brzenio, @cfuentea, @chihuahua-experience, @cristianritco, @dimaitre, @dotWee, @DrRoglaa, @dvanzoerlandt, @elislays08, @enormous-rat, @giulianopires, @gpnunes75, @HaiBliss, @hshsilver, @hw0603, @ibrayd, @jacktechstudio, @JulyIghor, @Kcraft059, @MapleLeaf14, @marcinkardas, @maximsenterprise, @MazlumSerbest, @mickimnet, @mikevic18, @MonolitheMedia, @moriLiu, @MStankiewiczOfficial, @niklasbogensperger, @old-cookie, @PatrykM13, @pavlik000-collab, @PuzzledUser, @SakiPapa, @shindgewongxj, @skantek, @sm-moshi, @stonkol, @sup3rb3ar, @yeager, @waydabber. AI was used for updating some of the localizations.

For previous release notes, visit the GitHub Releases page. Outdated license FAQ.

v4.3.3

This release adds nits-based normalized brightness syncing, direct brightness upscaling for built-in XDR displays, HDR virtual screens, improved LG webOS support. The version includes various fixes, performance and compatibility improvements for the latest version of macOS Tahoe as well.

Features

• Added direct brightness upscaling for built-in XDR displays (experimental) - #5242
• Added universal nits-based brightness sync mapping for normalized brightness synchronization (experimental) - #1393
• Added configurable nits ranges for displays that do not provide native nits readings - #5327
• Added parsing for HDR minimum, sustained maximum and peak brightness levels in nits - #5358
• Added option to show nits values in the app menu as well as the OSD - #5208
• Added improved nits output precision for low brightness values in the OSD - #5241
• Added forced HDR support and expanded Color Mode menu options, including mixed HDR modes - #5292
• Added mixed color mode support for outputting an SDR framebuffer with an HDR signal - #5256
• Added brightness upscaling support for third-party displays in mixed HDR mode - #5264
• Forced HDR mode is now preserved on wake - #5303
• Forced HDR mode is now preserved after refresh rate changes when the display drops out of HDR - #5371
• Made forced HDR mode compatible with Configuration Protection - #5372
• Added extra HDR capability details under Display Information - #5267
• Added HDR support for virtual screens - #5257
• Added HDR-only mode lists for virtual screens - #5259
• Added an explicit per-virtual-screen option for enabling resolutions over 8K / 4K HiDPI - #5374
• Added minimum and maximum range limits for direct brightness control - #5252
• Added separate device power on/off controls for LG webOS and Yamaha AVR devices - #5291
• Added option to power LG webOS and Yamaha AVR devices on/off when the display is detected or removed - #5296
• Added option to prevent LG webOS and Yamaha AVR devices from powering on after the display was disconnected during sleep - #5295
• Added help text to the LG webOS control UI about relevant TV settings - #5009
• Added current input retrieval for Yamaha AVRs - #5304
• Added Yamaha AVR power control only when the associated audio device is active - #5320
• Added option to avoid stealing input from already powered-on Yamaha AVRs - #5321
• Added input switching on wake for Yamaha AVRs - #5322
• Added option to avoid putting Yamaha AVRs to sleep when not switched to the Mac input - #5323
• Added option to remember soft-disconnected display state on app restart - #5309
• Improved reconnect behavior for soft-disconnected displays when the Pro trial runs out - #5298
• Added new OSD positioning option to show the OSD at top-right when the menu bar icon is visible and centered when it is hidden - #5299
• Improved app menu hiding behavior when clicking outside the menu - #5355
• Added cached app menu support for faster menu presentation - #5334
• Improved app menu animation performance - #5332
• Added adaptations for SOTSU 16" Gen 2 and 16" ELITE displays - #5313
• Added update channel support for differentiated Apple Silicon builds - #5341
• Added a Terminal option to temporarily disable power management assertions - #5367
• Added CLI options to get and set display nits levels - #5387 v4.3.1
• Added CLI option to toggle direct XDR upscaling - #5388 v4.3.1
• Added app intent (macOS Shortcut) for direct brightness upscaling - #5400 v4.3.2
• Brightness upscaling keyboard now works with direct upscaling as well - #5401 v4.3.2
• Improved compatibility with the latest macOS Tahoe versions
• Various performance improvements

Fixed

• Image Adjustments menu being empty when color table control is disabled and Metal is enabled - #5194
• Image adjustment delta syncing being ineffective when a target control had never been changed before - #5378
• Rapid brightness upscaling with combined brightness and Apple controllers could result in an incorrect upscaled brightness percentage - #5384
• Visual display identification not working on full-screen app spaces - #5245
• Numeric field entry issues in some mixed localization environments - #5255
• Incorrect Auto Brightness Toggle title in Shortcuts - #5209
• App menu sometimes appearing cropped, especially when the Color Mode menu was open - #5270
• Input Source and Display Presets submenu-specific tasks continuing to run when no longer needed - #5274
• App menu not closing after clicking an empty area - #5335
• App menu jumping to another screen when opened while a PIP window was on a different display - #5345
• Display Mode menu slowing down or not populating on some systems - #5351
• Settings window position not being remembered - #5373
• PIP/Stream zoom, underscan and magnification sliders behaving erratically - #5342
• PIP/Stream hover warning glass fading to black with black text in some circumstances - #5343
• Tabbed PIP windows not working properly, and hanging when "Prefer tabs when opening documents" is set to "Always" in System Settings - #5379
• OSD close icon shadow being abruptly cut off - #5316
• Slider percentage animation not reflecting whether the value is counting up or down while moving the slider - #5328
• Quantization slider showing the wrong initial value - #5338
• OSD flickering when mirroring or streaming a screen where brightness control affects both displays - #5344
• LG webOS controller attempting to reconnect while the display is disconnected - #5375
• External changes synchronization is broken for combined brightness control (v4.3.0 issue) - #5389 v4.3.1
• macOS Shortcuts seems to relaunch the app in macOS 26.5, causing the Settings window to appear momentarily - #5390 v4.3.1
• Combined brightness below min hardware level with Apple controllers tend to force nits syncing to dive down to zero in (v4.3.0 issue) - #5391 v4.3.1
• "Check for Updates" under the Tools menu tends linger when menu caching is enabled in v4.3.0 - #5392 v4.3.1
• Erratic nits syncing and reporting issue for some displays (v4.3.1 issue) - #5402 v4.3.2
• Non-cached app menu animation glitch when closing/opening a display section or toggling more options (v4.3.0 issue) - #5411 v4.3.3
• Direct upscaling adjustments cause internal warnings making adjustments a bit choppy in some scenarios (v4.3.0 issue) - #5412 v4.3.3

Included Localizations

• British English, Chinese Simplified, Chinese Traditional, Dutch, French, German, Hungarian, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Norwegian Bokmål, Polish, Portuguese Brazil, Romanian, Russian, Slovenian, Spanish, Swedish, Turkish, Ukrainian, and Vietnamese.
• Contributors: @afkeceli, @AndryTi, @andrwmai, @BingoKingo, @brzenio, @cfuentea, @chihuahua-experience, @cristianritco, @dimaitre, @dotWee, @DrRoglaa, @dvanzoerlandt, @elislays08, @enormous-rat, @giulianopires, @gpnunes75, @HaiBliss, @hshsilver, @hw0603, @ibrayd, @jacktechstudio, @JulyIghor, @Kcraft059, @MapleLeaf14, @marcinkardas, @maximsenterprise, @MazlumSerbest, @mickimnet, @mikevic18, @MonolitheMedia, @moriLiu, @MStankiewiczOfficial, @niklasbogensperger, @old-cookie, @PatrykM13, @pavlik000-collab, @PuzzledUser, @SakiPapa, @shindgewongxj, @skantek, @sm-moshi, @stonkol, @sup3rb3ar, @yeager, @waydabber. AI was used for updating some of the localizations.

The changelog above includes all changes since the last v4.x stable version. For previous release notes, visit the GitHub Releases page. Outdated license FAQ.

v4.3.2

This updated release candidate version contains various enhancements and bug fixes. Please refer to the changelog of the v4.3.3 stable release version for more information.

v4.3.1

This release candidate version contains various enhancements and bug fixes. Please refer to the changelog of the subsequent updated v4.3.2 release candidate version for more information.

v4.3.0

This pre-release version contains various enhancements and bug fixes. Please refer to the changelog of the subsequent v4.3.1 version for more information.

v4.2.3

This contains various enhancements and bug fixes.

Enhancements

• Added option to show brightness in nits in the OSD for supported displays - #5053
• Added keyboard shortcut support for LG webOS and Yamaha AVR input source changes - #5127
• Added macOS Shortcuts support for DDC, LG webOS and Yamaha AVR managed input source changes - #5128
• Support for managed Input Source using CLI - #5110
• Implement 2-pass wake for networked devices to compensate for slow-waking network cards - #5118
• Added a way to list configured controllers for a display using CLI - #5113
• Input switch on wake should not depend on enabled power control (to make this feature work with HDMI-CEC) - #5119
• Added non-persistent connection mode for LG webOS - #4943
• Added an option to disable DisplayLink auto-discovery and avoid discovery when launching in safe mode - #5126
• Added CLI for (experimental) and macOS Shortcuts support for compositor filters - #5132
• Added option to manually enter MAC address and specify WOL broadcast address for LG webOS - #5140
• Added option for a third delayed WOL after wake for LG webOS - #5141
• Command+W and Command+H should close/hide PIP windows - #5153
• Updated the DNC prefix to match the bundle identifier (while maintaining compatibility) - #5136
• Added keyboard shortcut for "Redetect Displays" - #5035
• Added an option to always show OSD on main display regardless of affected device and window/menu bar with focus location - #4922
• BetterDisplay open/close notifications for 3rd party integrations - #5174
• Improved memory management - #5147

Fixed

• Full screen PIP window issues - window cannot be closed, stopping stream results in blank space, some other interaction (minimize etc) may cause crash - #5155
• Third Party App OSD integration unavailable without Pro - #5102
• CLI bool set operations should not return Failed when the setting is already in the desired state - #5111
• LG webOS persistent connection silent failure - #5131
• Volume value not adjusted with configured maximum when getting volume from LG webOS device - #5133
• The LG webOS controller asks about a PIN code on the "Philips TV" during pairing... - #5134
• LG and Samsung wake (WOL) does not work if the user provides a hostname instead of an IP address - #5139
• URL scheme toggle operation requires empty parameter value - #5149
• Built-in HTTP server may cause a crash - #5154
• WOL logic may crash if hostname is provided instead of IP address for a networked device - #5165
• Delayed check timeout for Apple control capability may be too short resulting in lack of Apple hardware control on newly connected external Apple displays - #5187
• An invalid '0' or '1' is shown as native XDR brightness upscaling OSD nits value on macOS 26.2 and older in v4.2.2 - #5192

Note: This is a hotfix release to address a reported OSD issue in the recent v4.2.2 release, affecting older macOS versions – no new features were added. The changelog is carried over from the previous release.

Included Localizations

• British English (@PuzzledUser)
• Chinese, Simplified (@BingoKingo, @shindgewongxj, @hshsilver, @jacktechstudio)
• Chinese, Traditional (@old-cookie, @moriLiu)
• Dutch (@dvanzoerlandt)
• French (@Kcraft059, @MonolitheMedia)
• German (@mickimnet, @dotWee, @niklasbogensperger, @sm-moshi)
• Hungarian (@sup3rb3ar)
• Italian (@MapleLeaf14)
• Japanese (@SakiPapa)
• Korean (@hw0603, @chihuahua-experience)
• Norwegian Bokmål (@elislays08)
• Polish (@MStankiewiczOfficial, @PatrykM13, @brzenio, @enormous-rat, @marcinkardas, @skantek)
• Portuguese, Brazil (@gpnunes75, @giulianopires)
• Romanian (@mikevic18, @cristianritco)
• Russian (@dimaitre, @pavlik000-collab, @AndryTi)
• Slovenian (@DrRoglaa)
• Spanish (@stonkol, @cfuentea, @maximsenterprise)
• Swedish (@yeager)
• Turkish (@MazlumSerbest, @ibrayd, @afkeceli)
• Ukrainian (@JulyIghor)
• Vietnamese (@andrwmai, @HaiBliss)

The changelog above includes all changes since the last v4.x stable version. For previous release notes, visit the GitHub Releases page. Outdated license FAQ. AI was used for completing some of the localizations. Help improve BetterDisplay localization, correct mistranslations, or assist in adding new languages! Developed by @waydabber.

v4.2.2

This version contains various enhancements and bug fixes.

Please be aware that this version contains an OSD related issue affecting some older macOS versions. A follow-up version is available with a fix.

v4.2.1

This pre-version contains various enhancements and bug fixes.

v4.2.0

This pre-release version contains various minor enhancements and bug fixes.

v4.1.5

This version contains various enhancements, bug fixes and improved compatibility with the latest macOS Tahoe 26.3 version.

Enhancements

• Improved DisplayLink support with the ability to auto-detect DisplayLink displays (requires up-to-date DisplayLink Manager) - #5066
• Added support for DDC brightness and contrast control for DisplayLink displays (experimental, requires up-to-date DisplayLink Manager) - #4322
• Auto-configure color table adjustment support for DisplayLink devices - #5064
• Provide appropriate display icon for DisplayLink devices - #5065
• Settings icons in dark mode should look dark (with black background and color icon) - #5068
• Simplified and flattened the Input Source menu (#4941)
• Updated the Input Source menu to support input source selectors for multiple controllers (#4946)
• Improved connection resilience for LG webOS devices (#4942)
• Added input source selection support for LG webOS TVs (#4870)
• Added a “Power off only on Mac input” option for LG webOS TVs (#4940)
• Added a “Switch to Mac input” option for LG webOS TVs (#4958)
• Added Samsung Smart Device auto-reconnect and improved connection stability (#4974)
• Added an HDMI input button to the Samsung TV remote (#4912)
• Added input source menu support for Yamaha AVRs (disabled by default) (#4945)
• Added an option to expand or contract the TV remote to hide the numeric keypad and color buttons (#4913)
• Switched to the standard unanimated menu bar icon highlight for OSD instead of the animated one on macOS Tahoe 26.2 and newer (#4961)
• Improved guidance for configuring the app with DisplayLink displays (#4897)
• Added a CLI command for the “swap two identical displays” feature (#5003)
• Made third-party app OSD integration available without Pro (#4991)
• Removed native XDR upscaling on macOS Tahoe 26.3 due to the tightened preset validations (#4936, #5049)
• Various OSD improvements - #5084
• Updated Apple presets for compatibility with macOS Tahoe 26.3 (#4932)

Fixed

• Smart devices not being turned on with wake upon reconnecting a soft-disconnected display - #5061
• Some configuration changes for disconnected displays may load ineffective controllers - #5069
• Fixed an issue where third-party HDR display brightness upscaling could become ineffective after sleep/wake (root cause: macOS Tahoe 26 bug) (#4918)
• Fixed popup positioning jumping to the left when using the ICE menu bar manager (#4978)
• Fixed app menu graphical glitches on Intel Macs running macOS Tahoe (#5002)
• Locked Pro shortcuts for DDC Display Input Source cannot be deleted after trial expires - #5092
• Interaction with the OSD slider sometimes fails on slider-clicking instead of dragging - #5076

Included Localizations

This version includes the following localizations:

• British English (@PuzzledUser)
• Chinese, Simplified (@BingoKingo, @shindgewongxj, @hshsilver, @jacktechstudio)
• Chinese, Traditional (@old-cookie, @moriLiu)
• Dutch (@dvanzoerlandt)
• French (@Kcraft059, @MonolitheMedia)
• German (@mickimnet, @dotWee, @niklasbogensperger, @sm-moshi)
• Hungarian (@sup3rb3ar)
• Italian (@MapleLeaf14)
• Japanese (@SakiPapa)
• Korean (@hw0603, @chihuahua-experience)
• Norwegian Bokmål (@elislays08)
• Polish (@MStankiewiczOfficial, @PatrykM13, @brzenio, @enormous-rat, @marcinkardas)
• Portuguese, Brazil (@gpnunes75, @giulianopires)
• Romanian (@mikevic18, @cristianritco)
• Russian (@dimaitre, @pavlik000-collab, @AndryTi)
• Slovenian (@DrRoglaa)
• Spanish (@stonkol, @cfuentea, @maximsenterprise)
• Swedish (@yeager)
• Turkish (@MazlumSerbest, @ibrayd, @afkeceli)
• Ukrainian (@JulyIghor)
• Vietnamese (@andrwmai, @HaiBliss)

Help improve BetterDisplay localization, correct mistranslations, or assist in adding new languages!

Special thanks to all contributors!

Information if you are updating from a previous major version of the app

Free upgrade if you purchased Pro after July 15, 2024:

• If you bought Pro for v3.x (any purchase after July 15, 2024), your license works with v4.x automatically.
• If your Pro license goes back to v1.x or v2.x (any purchase before July 15, 2024), you'll need to get a new Pro license for v4.x.
• If you update an activated app with an outdated (v1.x, v2.x) license, Pro remains active – but a license warning will appear.
• Free features are available for non-Pro users as before.

More info: outdated license FAQ