Everything in the app and how to use it. Machine-readable version at /llms.txt.
Sistine is a native macOS app that works like any other Mac app: one window where a small animated ghost greets you with a full AI chat, voice, documents, and a dock of pre-built mini-apps. It runs free on your own hardware with a local model, and it can borrow bigger brains, hosted models, your own API keys, or your existing Claude and ChatGPT subscriptions, when you choose. Requires macOS 14 or newer on an Apple silicon Mac.
When the app launches, download it, drag it to Applications, and open it. A six-page setup walks you through the essentials: how to bring Sistine up from any app, voice permissions (skippable), and a one-click Set Up Free Local AI button that downloads and runs a model sized to your Mac's memory. When it finishes, Sistine opens in its own window and everything works, offline, with no account and no key.
Pricing is shown plainly during setup, before any paywall: the free tier is the product, not a teaser, and it even includes 40 web searches a day. Paid plans lift the search limit, add hosted models, and raise the ceilings.
Sistine lives in one ordinary Mac window, with the ghost in its top left corner. It is in the Dock, in ⌘ Tab and Mission Control, and it goes full screen like any app.
The home page shows the ghost, a one-line status of what needs your attention ("3 emails need a reply · 4 routine items left"), a composer, and a dock of mini-app icons. Hovering an icon lifts it and lights it up; right-click to remove apps you don't use, and the + button brings them back or makes a new app in Code.
Ask anything in the composer. Replies stream in with full Markdown, code blocks you can copy, and native answer cards: big-number stat rows, comparisons, timelines, charts, and product grids render as designed components, not walls of text.
One microphone button, two idioms: hold it to talk walkie-talkie style (release to finish) or click to latch recording until you click again. Esc cancels. A status row shows "Getting ready…" while the engine warms up, then "Listening, go ahead" with a live transcript as you speak, so no words get lost.
Transcription is Apple Speech, on-device whenever the Mac supports it. The app records only while you hold the button (or, if you click to latch, until you click again or press Esc), and never listens in the background. Sistine can also speak responses aloud, with a choice of system voice, speaking rate, and an option to skip code blocks.
Sistine works with whatever intelligence you already have. Four ways in, from free to frontier:
| Source | What it is | Cost |
|---|---|---|
| Local | One click sets up a model on this Mac, sized to its memory, bound to localhost. Your chats never leave the machine. | Free forever |
| Another computer | Point the app at a Mac on your network running Ollama or LM Studio. Discovered automatically, picked from what is actually installed there. | Free |
| Cloud | Hosted models on Plus, Pro, and Max with no setup; those plans can also point the app at any OpenAI-compatible endpoint with your own key, kept in the macOS Keychain. | Plan or your own rates |
| Your subscriptions | The Code module signs in with Claude Code or Codex. Your Claude or ChatGPT plan does the coding; the rest of the app keeps using your own model. | Your existing plan |
The app is smart about local models: it detects Ollama and raises the context window so long prompts don't get silently truncated, routes image questions to a vision-capable model when your main model can't see, and routes tool use to a tools-capable model when yours can't call them. For local servers, a capability line under the model picker tells you what your choice can do before anything fails mid-conversation.
The free tier is local and network only by policy. Hosted plans are capped by dollars, not message counts; at the cap, replies draw on any credits you hold, then fall back to your local model rather than stopping.
Modules are full pages inside the main window, each with its own ask bar that answers questions grounded in what's on screen. Some start off the opening dock; the + button on the home page adds them.
| Module | What it does |
|---|---|
| All your inboxes in one place over IMAP with an app password: Gmail, iCloud, Fastmail, Yahoo, anything. Sorts people from noise, flags what needs a reply, drafts responses in your voice, and sends over SMTP. HTML mail renders with JavaScript off and remote images (trackers) blocked unless you turn them on. Your mail syncs directly with your provider, with no mail server of ours in the middle, and with private mode on (the default), the AI reading it runs on your local model. | |
| Telegram | Your own Telegram account in the app: DMs, groups, channels, and bots, with a Radar tab where a local model flags likely spam from strangers for one-tap block or report. Uses the Telegram API. Sistine is an unofficial Telegram client, not affiliated with Telegram. |
| Chats | Every conversation with your companion, searchable. |
| Holders | The Sistine holders' group chat, gated on signature-verified wallet ownership, with scam-flagging and moderation built in. |
| Recorder | Screen recording with a countdown, optional camera bubble, and a demo editor: auto-zoom, click ripples, soundtrack, an AI-written voiceover script, and export. |
| Module | What it does |
|---|---|
| To-Dos | A window onto Apple Reminders. Items added here or by the assistant appear on your iPhone and Watch. |
| Routines | Pick self-care goals once and get a short daily list, each item with a plain "how", an honest "why" backed by research, and any warning always shown. |
| Code | Build a website or a program by describing it. No terminal, no diffs: conversation on the left, live preview on the right, a plain-English change list with Undo, and one-click publishing to a real web address with a QR code. Three autonomy levels, from sandboxed to trusted, each stated in plain words. Mini-apps you build can join the dock, sandboxed to a narrow bridge: to-dos, weather, small per-app storage, and a rate-capped ask-the-AI call, and nothing else on your Mac. |
| Weather | Apple-Weather-style forecast for your chosen home spot, which is saved on your Mac. |
| Module | What it does |
|---|---|
| Shopping | Curated shopping that remembers who you shop for. A people rail files saves under each person with their occasions; a curator chat finds real products with prices, stores, and links. |
| Mint | Claim a Sistine Ghost, free for app users. See the Ghosts. |
| Points | Daily claims, holding accrual, levels, and a scoreboard. Points have no monetary value and only ever redeem inside the app. |
Abilities are what the assistant can do beyond talking, grouped under switches in Settings (memory, web access, screen awareness, desktop actions). Tools you haven't enabled are never even shown to the model, so it can't be talked into trying them.
Web search is included with zero setup, 40 searches a day through our proxy, no account. Add your own free Brave key to make searches unlimited and cut our server out of the loop entirely.
Four looks: Match System, Light, Dark, and Gallery, which hangs a public-domain masterpiece behind the window's dark glass. Ten paintings ship with the app (Van Gogh, Vermeer, Hokusai, Monet, Turner, and friends), rotating on a half-hour clock. Pin the one you love, or add your own images and they join the rotation.
You can also give your companion a personality in one line, change the chat text size, and reduce animation.
Private by default is an architecture, not a promise. The short version:
The full policy is in the app and at sistine.ai/privacy.
Sistine Ghosts is a collection of 2,222 generative ghost companions on Robinhood Chain, minted as an ERC-721C with a 5% creator royalty. Every ghost is grown from a hash: one algorithm, 2,222 tokens, no two alike, spanning 35 trait types from body and cloth to motion and presence. Most ghosts are calm and clean by design; the loud ones are rare on purpose.
The ghost renderer derives from “Ghost” by OpenProcessing user “me” (openprocessing.org/sketch/1138728, CC BY-SA 3.0), substantially reworked; the artwork is licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.
| Shortcut | Action |
|---|---|
| ⌥ Space | Bring Sistine to the front from any app, or hide it (configurable) |
| ⌘N | New chat |
| ⌘⇧S | Summarize my screen |
| ⌘⇧V | Ask about clipboard |
| ⌘W | Close the window (Sistine keeps running) |
| ⌘M | Minimize to the Dock |
| ⌘+ / ⌘- | Bigger or smaller chat text |
| Esc | Cancel voice, then back to Home |
| ⌘, | Settings |
| ⌘Q | Quit |
Yes. The whole app runs free on your own hardware with a one-click local model, forever, including 40 web searches a day. The Search plan ($9/mo) lifts that limit, and hosted models come with Plus ($19/mo), Pro ($49/mo), and Max ($199/mo).
Not your conversations, by default. With a local model they stay on your Mac, and only web search queries go through our search service. Cloud providers see only what you send them, only when you ask, and private mode keeps your mail and messages local even then.
macOS 14 Sonoma or newer, on an Apple silicon Mac (M1 or later). Intel Macs are not supported: the app ships as an arm64 build and will not launch on them.
Yes, for the Code module. Sign in once with your own account and your subscription does the coding. Chat and the other modules keep using your companion's own model, since subscriptions don't allow general use in other apps.
Only what you enable, and anything with a side effect (opening links, calendar events, Shortcuts, running commands) shows an approval card naming the exact action, every time. Background runs fail closed.
Get the app at launch. Minting is free for app users at launch: one voucher per person, minted straight to your own 0x wallet.
Questions this page doesn't answer: support@sistine.ai