Native Mac app for Gmail · Public beta
All your Gmail accounts in a native Mac app. Translate messages and summarize threads on your device, not in someone else's cloud.
All InboxesTwo accounts, one list, a colour per account
PrimaryGmail's categories, labels and search, in a Mac window
Built for Gmail
Merubo speaks to Google's Gmail API directly, so the parts of Gmail you rely on behave the way Gmail does, inside a real three-pane Mac window.
Primary, Social, Promotions and Updates are inbox categories, not folders. Labels are labels. Archive puts a thread in All Mail.
Type the operators you know, from:sara has:attachment, and Gmail runs the search, with results in a Mac list.
E archives, # deletes, S stars. Dark Mode, notifications, a Dock badge and drag-and-drop attachments come with the Mac.
Merubo covers the everyday Gmail features, not all of them. Snooze, filters and the vacation responder are not in the app; gmail.com is a click away for those.
Gmail's inbox categories, with their unread counts, in a Mac sidebar.
Translation
Mail that arrives in another language is translated into yours before you open it, by the translation built into macOS. The message is read on your Mac and nowhere else. One click shows the original.
Hej Emma,
Här är din biljett. Visa den på mobilen eller skriv ut den innan du går ombord.
| Avgång | Stockholm C · 2 okt · 07:12 |
| Ankomst | Göteborg C · 2 okt · 10:19 |
| Tåg | SJ Snabbtåg 421 · Vagn 4 · Plats 22, fönster |
Hi Emma,
Here is your ticket. Show it on your phone or print it before you board.
| Departure | Stockholm C · 2 Oct · 07:12 |
| Arrival | Göteborg C · 2 Oct · 10:19 |
| Train | SJ Snabbtåg 421 · Coach 4 · Seat 22, window |
Translated on your Mac. Sample mail drawn from Merubo's interface; the "Translated from" line, Show Original and ⌘T are the real controls.
Summaries
A long thread, summarized into a short paragraph by Apple Intelligence, on your Mac. Nothing is summarized until you click Summarize, and the summary streams into a card above the thread so the messages stay right there to check against.
Linnea confirmed that Friday's review will happen in person in the Ljus room on the big display rather than over a screen share, and asked for the agenda by Thursday. You agreed to send it Thursday evening, offered to bring the printed packaging mockups, and proposed starting at 10.
Summarized on deviceIllustration with sample mail; the summary is example output, not a recording of the model.
Accounts
Work, personal and the side project, each a Gmail or Google Workspace account, in one window. Read them together in All Inboxes, where a colour dot on every message says which account it came from, or keep them apart. Switching is one click or one keystroke.
All Inboxes in Dark Mode. Blue is Northlight, green is Personal.
Privacy
Your email goes directly between your Mac and Google. Merubo never receives it. Translation, summaries and the copy of recent mail that makes the app fast all stay inside your Mac.
Merubo
Remote images in a message are blocked by default. If you choose to load them, your Mac fetches them from the sender, as any mail app would.
If you unsubscribe from a mailing list and confirm it, Merubo sends one request to the address the sender published. It goes to the sender, not to Merubo.
Mail is cached on your Mac the way your other files are: protected by your user account, and by FileVault if it is on. Merubo does not add an encryption layer of its own. The full detail is in the privacy policy.
The details
Type the operators you know and Gmail runs the search; results land in a Mac list. ⌘F to start, Escape to leave.
Primary, Social, Promotions, Updates and Forums, each on or off per account. Your labels, with Gmail's colours, and Move to and Label from the toolbar.
Gmail's single keys and the Mac's menus, together.
Tracking pixels from more than 180 known vendors are removed before a message is drawn, and Merubo names who was watching. The list ships inside the app and is never downloaded.
A mailing-list message shows an Unsubscribe banner. Nothing is sent until you confirm, and the confirmation names the sender and the account.
Dark Mode, notifications and a Dock badge with their own account scope, attachments dropped into a reply, downloads straight to your Downloads folder, and Apple silicon only, so the on-device models have room to work.
Why Merubo
Merubo is for people who live in Gmail on a Mac and want it to feel like a Mac app: a window, not a tab. It earns its place if you get mail in more than one language, or want thread summaries without sending your mail to a cloud service.
It is a public beta from a small company. Expect rough edges, and expect them fixed. Snooze, filters and the vacation responder are not planned, and outgoing mail is kept simple: text, links and images, without fonts, colours or tables.
If you need a released app today, run an Intel Mac, or rely on Gmail's power features, Mimestream is the other native Gmail client for Mac and may suit you better. We say so in the comparison.
Merubo is made by Clovelly AB in Sweden. Questions, bugs and feature requests go to hello@merubo.app, and they are read by the person who builds the app.
Merubo is an independent app. It is not made by, endorsed by or affiliated with Google.
Getting started
Merubo's beta is distributed through TestFlight, Apple's own app for trying apps before they reach the App Store. No account with us, no email address, nothing to fill in.
Get Apple's free TestFlight from the Mac App Store, if it isn't already on your Mac.
Open Merubo's beta link on your Mac, accept, and TestFlight installs Merubo and keeps it updated.
Open Merubo and sign in on Google's screen. Make sure the Gmail access box is ticked, since Google may show it unticked. Your inbox appears, and a short tour covers notifications and translation.
Needs a Mac with Apple silicon on macOS 27 or later, and Apple's free TestFlight app. Beta builds expire after 90 days; TestFlight offers the update.
Reading this on your phone? Merubo is a Mac app. Email yourself the link, or open merubo.app on your Mac.
A Mac with Apple silicon running macOS 27 or later, and a Gmail or Google Workspace account. During the beta you also need Apple's free TestFlight app. Translation needs a translation model for your Mac's language, which macOS offers to download. Summaries need Apple Intelligence turned on in System Settings.
TestFlight is Apple's own app for trying apps before they reach the App Store. You install it from the Mac App Store, open Merubo's beta link, and TestFlight installs Merubo and keeps it updated. Beta builds expire after 90 days, so you will be asked to update occasionally.
Merubo is free during the public beta. At release it will be a yearly subscription on the Mac App Store with a 7-day free trial, covering every Gmail account you connect on every Mac signed in with your Apple Account. The price has not been announced yet. See the terms.
There is no Merubo mail server. Your mail goes directly between your Mac and Google over HTTPS, and translation and summaries run on your Mac. Merubo never receives your mail and has no analytics or tracking. The two exceptions are things you ask for: loading a message's remote images fetches them from the sender, and confirming an unsubscribe sends one request to the address the sender published. The privacy policy has the detail.
Merubo works through Google's Gmail API, so archiving, deleting, starring, labels and read state are changes to your Gmail account itself. Gmail on the web and on your phone show the same thing, and mail you send from Merubo appears in Gmail's Sent.
Settings ▸ Accounts ▸ Remove Account deletes that account's cached mail and sign-in tokens from your Mac and revokes Merubo's access at Google. You can also revoke access at any time at myaccount.google.com/permissions.
No. Merubo works with Gmail and Google Workspace accounts only.
Apple Mail treats Gmail as a generic mail account over IMAP. Merubo is built only for Gmail, through the Gmail API, so categories, labels, archive and Gmail's own search operators behave as they do in Gmail. It also translates mail and summarizes threads on your Mac.
Both are native Mac apps that connect directly to the Gmail API. Mimestream has shipped for years and has a deeper Gmail feature set. Merubo adds on-device translation and thread summaries and is in public beta. See Merubo vs Mimestream.
Gmail in a native Mac app, with translation and summaries that stay on your Mac.
Try the free betaFree during the beta · macOS 27 on Apple silicon · Installs through Apple's TestFlight