Lychee

Definition: Lychee is a native macOS menu bar application designed to display real-time, synchronized lyrics for music played through Spotify and Apple Music. It falls under the technical category of desktop music companion and utility software.
Core Value Proposition: Lychee exists to provide a seamless, non-intrusive lyrics viewing experience directly from the macOS menu bar, eliminating the need to switch applications or search for lyrics manually. Its core value is privacy-focused, instant lyrics access with zero login requirements and minimal system footprint.

Local Lyrics Cache: Lychee implements a local caching system that stores lyrics files on your Mac's storage after the first fetch. This means subsequent plays of the same song trigger zero loading time, as lyrics are served instantly from the local cache instead of a remote server, enhancing performance and reliability.
Menu Bar Mini Player: Clicking the Lychee menu bar icon reveals an expanded mini-player overlay. This panel displays album artwork, playback progress, transport controls (play/pause, next, previous), and provides access to lyric options like cycling through different lyric versions, saving preferences, and opening settings.
Customizable Display & Stealth Mode: Users can adjust menu bar text width, font size, gap style (single or double line), and theme (light/dark). Lychee operates with no persistent dock icon, residing solely in the menu bar. It features an intelligent auto-compact function that detects when music stops and reverts to a minimal icon-only state to conserve menu bar space.

Pain Point: It solves the disruptive workflow of alt-tabbing between a music player and a browser or separate lyrics app, which breaks immersion and productivity. It also addresses privacy concerns associated with lyrics apps that require user accounts or excessive permissions.
Target Audience: The primary user personas are macOS power users and music enthusiasts who value a clean desktop, Spotify and Apple Music subscribers who want integrated lyrics, and multitaskers (developers, writers, students) who want lyrics accessible without leaving their current full-screen application.
Use Cases: Essential for karaoke practice at your desk, learning song lyrics in real-time, enhancing music listening immersion while working in other apps, and controlling playback without bringing the main music application to the foreground.

Differentiation: Unlike browser-based lyrics sites or music player's built-in full-screen lyrics views, Lychee is a dedicated, lightweight menu bar utility. Compared to other desktop lyrics apps, it distinguishes itself by requiring no login/signup, offering a local-first cache architecture, and providing extensive menu bar display customization.
Key Innovation: The key technical innovation is its intelligent local caching mechanism paired with the LRCLIB open-source lyrics database. This combination ensures fast, offline-capable lyric retrieval. Its context-aware UI (auto-compact) and menu bar-embedded mini-player represent a refined approach to macOS-native, unobtrusive application design.

Is Lychee for macOS safe and free? Yes, Lychee is completely free to download and use. It is safe as it requires no login, collects minimal data, and is a native macOS app. If blocked by Gatekeeper on first open, you can approve it in System Settings > Privacy & Security.
How does Lychee get lyrics for Spotify and Apple Music? Lychee fetches lyrics from the LRCLIB open-source lyrics library, a community-driven database. It detects the currently playing song via macOS system media APIs and queries LRCLIB for synchronized (synced) or plain text lyrics.
What should I do if Lychee shows wrong or no lyrics? You can cycle through available lyric versions using the controls in the mini-player. If you find the correct one, save it, and Lychee will cache that version locally. If no lyrics are found, the song may not yet be in the LRCLIB database.
Does Lychee work when my music app is in the background or minimized? Yes, Lychee works independently by reading system-wide media playback information. It will display lyrics as long as Spotify or Apple Music is playing audio on your Mac, regardless of whether the app is focused, minimized, or in the background.
How do I update or uninstall Lychee on my Mac? To update, download the new DMG file from the website and replace the application in your Applications folder. To uninstall, simply drag the Lychee app from your Applications folder to the Trash, as it stores all data locally within the app container.

Lyrics in menu bar