Cleanux help

Installing

Open the downloaded .dmg and drag Cleanux into your Applications folder. That's the whole install. There is no installer, no helper tool, no background agent and nothing added to your login items.

Cleanux needs macOS 14 (Sonoma) or later, and runs natively on both Apple silicon and Intel Macs.

"Cleanux can't be opened"

Cleanux is signed with an Apple Developer ID and notarised by Apple, so this shouldn't happen. If it does, it usually means the download was interrupted or unpacked by a tool that stripped the signature.

Try downloading the .dmg again in Safari and opening it directly. If macOS still objects, open System Settings → Privacy & Security, scroll down, and click Open Anyway next to the message about Cleanux.

If neither works, email us rather than disabling Gatekeeper. Something is wrong on our side and we'd like to know.

Your licence key

After you buy, your key arrives by email. It's a long single line of letters and numbers with a full stop in the middle.

1. Open Cleanux.
2. Click Enter key, next to any Buy button, or open Settings → Licence.
3. Paste the whole key and click Activate.

That's it. The signature on your key is checked on your Mac with maths, not by a server. We are asked one question when you activate: whether this licence has been withdrawn, which is how a refunded key can be stopped. So activation needs an internet connection once. After that Cleanux works offline, and if it ever cannot reach us, your licence carries on working. Your name is inside the key, which is why the app greets you by it afterwards.

Your key never expires. One purchase, yours permanently, including future updates to Cleanux 1.x.

Lost your key

Email support@greyfoxlimited.com from the address you bought with and we'll resend it. We keep a record of every key issued, so there's no need to buy again.

The trial

The trial is the complete app for 14 days, with nothing withheld.

When it ends, scanning carries on working forever. You can keep using Cleanux to find out where your space has gone for as long as you like. Only the cleaning step asks for a licence.

Full Disk Access

macOS keeps some folders hidden from apps by default, including parts of Mail, Messages and your backups. Cleanux works without Full Disk Access, but in those areas it will honestly report that it couldn't look rather than claim it found nothing.

To grant it: System Settings → Privacy & Security → Full Disk Access, then switch Cleanux on. Quit and reopen Cleanux afterwards, as macOS only applies the change to a fresh launch.

You can revoke it at any time in the same place, and Cleanux will carry on working with less reach.

Using it safely

Smart Clean is the guided route: it scans, shows you everything it found, and cleans only what you confirm.

Everything it finds is graded, and the grade decides what comes ready ticked:

• Safe to remove - regenerates on its own. These arrive selected.
• Worth a look first - fine to delete, but you'd notice. Never pre-selected.
• Hard to replace - shown for completeness so nothing is hidden from you. Never pre-selected.

Nothing outside the safe grade is ever ticked for you, and nothing goes at all until you press the button.

Every path Cleanux can look at is published here, built from the app's own source.

Getting something back

By default Cleanux moves things to the Bin, which means your Mac's own Put Back works as normal.

Inside the app, Restore Centre lists every operation Cleanux has run and can put an entire batch back in one go.

If you switch the mode to Delete permanently, that is genuinely permanent and Cleanux asks you to confirm before it does it. There is no undo for that, by design, and nothing is restorable afterwards.

Protected Paths, in the app, lets you mark anything you never want Cleanux to touch. Anything inside a protected path is skipped by every tool.

The audit log

Every removal Cleanux makes is written to a log on your Mac. The entries are chained together, so changing an earlier one breaks every entry after it and the app can tell. The Audit Log screen re-checks the whole chain against your disk and tells you whether it still adds up.

You can export it, and read it from the command line with cleanux verify.

Privacy

The only thing Cleanux sends is a check for whether a newer version of itself exists. There is no account, no sign-in, no analytics and no crash reporting.

No list of your files, no paths, no sizes and nothing about your Mac goes anywhere. The licence check happens entirely on your machine.

Refunds

The 14-day trial is there so you can find out before paying. If you've bought it and it isn't what you wanted, email us within 30 days and we'll refund you. You don't have to give a reason.