Have you tried out File Buffers that came with Alfred? You search a file and use arrow to park it on the Alfred bar for instant access.
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This is a great thread. The key difference from me between Spotlight and Alfred is workflows. Alfred can also launch Keyboard maestro macros.
I used Alfred, then switched to Raycast a few years ago. I think I was seduced by the pretty interface, newness, and ease of use. But a couple of months ago I switched back to Alfred first as an experiment, but quickly deleted Raycast.
Itās a faster launcher, and I feel it performs more complete (and quick) searches. I recently learned how to use snippets, which replaces TextExpander for me. It also does clipboard history as well as Raycast did.
I feel like Iāve just scratched the surface of Alfredās capabilities. Iām no power user of Alfred at all, but Iāve found that every time I invest some time in learning a new feature, it abundantly rewards me and saves me time and hassle.
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The free version of Raycast also does pretty much all the things people are mentioning, either OOTB or with extensions (there are a lot of app integrations available in the extensions). As I said, itās mostly personal preference.
I find the built in window manager handy; not sure if Alfred has that.
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Hello and thank you so much to everyone who posted on this thread. I followed your recommendations and installed both Alfred and Raycast andā¦ I canāt really decide between them both.
I know Alfred, I like the icon. The standard interface looks outdated but I know that there are a ton of awesome looking skins I would like to use. Iām not sure if I should buy the Powerpack, yet. But Iām almost there. Iām born in the 80s and I grew up with computers. Alfred has its charm. I know my way around, everything feels a little bit outdated and old school, which is a plus because Iām familiar with stuff like this.
Raycast, on the other hand feels fresh and new and looks awesome. I like how it works and how it feels. It feels ānewerā than Alfred. A big plus is that I can try it with everything I need and it is free. 70ā¬ for lifetime is a deal but on the other hand I could just spend it otherwise.
I really want to know if it is worth it for me because Alfred with all the workflows seems great but I would love to try Alfred before buying which isnāt possible I guess.
Raycast wonāt cost me a thing because I donāt need AI, or better, the little stuff I need from AI I get for free with ChatGPT.
What I donāt like about Raycast is the way plugins are installed. But I guess thatās because Iām not a keyboard only person. For me, the Escape key is a mile away. It feels tedious to always enter into sub menus or escape out of them. Plugins are sometimes outdated. Iām using Kagi and the Kagi plugin in Raycast is back from 2022 when Kagi was in beta. It works but it feelsā¦ unsettlingā¦ what if the plugin stops working? It was made by a single person. Alfred handles this better.
But the one thing that really is a big negative with Raycast is that it uses much more energy than Alfred. Right now the Activity app tells me that Raycast used 0.43 units (%, watts, I dunno) and Alfred used 0.04 within one hour.
Raycast is using 10 times the power of Alfred for 3 search queries and idling. Iāve read that a lot of plugins in Raycast use Electron whichā¦ means even more power usage. Iām kind of sensitive in this regard.
Donāt get me wrong, it is no resource hog by any means but Alfred is just more efficient. Soā¦ I donāt know yet.
Iām torn. I guess I will keep playing with both and decide when I know which one I use more often. I wish I could buy the Powerpack and get a refund after one or two days if Iām not satisfied. Iām leaning a very tiny bit more towards Alfred at the moment. But this can change if I get more into Raycast and its way of handling stuff. 
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If I were just starting out , would I use Recast? Not sure.I know Alfred well and the switching cost would be high. The one thing that Raycast offered that Alfred didnāt (easily) was window positioning. Moom works well, especially with the new update. I can also cobble together a workflow with Alfred without too much difficulty. Raycast seemed much harder(this could easily be a familiarity effect).
When I got my first Mac I heard about Quicksilver which I guess was the first Mac OS launcher. Very elegant but also quite buggy. Then I got Alfred. Ugly but worked and was easy to use. So I got hooked. And much like Topreās image, above, there is the cringeworthy song āIf You Wanna Be Happy - Song by JIMMY SOUL - Apple Music.
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Iām not sure how Alfred handles it, to be fair, but all of Raycastās extensions are open source, meaning that anyone in the community (whoās willing to put the effort in) can maintain and extend them. Not that this is a silver bullet by any means, but it does help prevent extensions from ādying on the vineā. If one were to stop working itās likely someone would patch it - and if not, thereās a very active Slack community for Raycast where you could bring attention to it.
Not sure where you read this, but itās not true - there is no dependency on electron in any Raycast extension, and everything you see on screen is rendered natively in Swift. There is some background JS code running for extensions, but there are strict limits on memory usage there.
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I agree with you that Alfredās interface looks outdated. That was probably the primary reason I switched to Raycast for a couple of years. I wish theyād update it.
It comes down to your needs and desires. Thatās easy to say, but itās difficult to choose when apps have different strengths and weaknesses. Youāre wise to experiment more and see what sticks for you. 
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Lest any people involved with Alfred despair and do harm to themselves, I want to say that I like the way Alfred looks.
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Iāve never understood this comment. To me, the interface I see most often doesnāt seem all that different from Spotlight.
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I agree! Me too. Itās simple and minimalist. Whatās there not to like?
In fact, I went bold and thick border:
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Of course, liking the way something looks and being outdated are not necessarily exclusive concepts! Hence, the fashionability of vintage clothing.
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Wanted to note too, Iām a big user of the Alfred Remote app, on iPad. My iPad pretty much sits in front of my keyboard whenever Iām at my computer, basically like a stream deck.
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Great thread. Now do Keyboard Maestro vs Alfred.
No need to. They complement each other and have different purposes.
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Yes, the Alfred remote app for iOS devices is underrated! You can add your own workflows etc to it.
About the interfaceā¦ The workflow creating interface doesnāt look fancy, but thatās okay, itās functional and thatās what matters. For the search bar I installed a spotlight theme that adapts to light or dark mode. Doesnāt look outdated to me.
And I love the actions of Alfred. I configured for example some actions to move selected files to a specific folder (and where Hazel then takes over). I just need to double tap the shift-key and type the first letters of the folder and hit enter and boom magic happens. I also configured some actions that I hooked to A Better Finder Rename action. Automation at its best!
And yes, I also tried Raycast but besides the āshiny-new-thing-effectā, it didnāt click for me.
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