Window Preview & Window Expansion

The single most useful thing about a radial menu, once you've moved past "faster Dock," is that a wedge can do more than launch. When you hover an app that already has multiple windows open, the wedge can fan those windows out as an outer arc, with each window addressable individually. Hover the one you want, release, that exact window comes to the front. No Cmd+`, no Mission Control swap.

This guide covers the two layers of that feature — Window Expansion (icons + titles) and Window Preview (live thumbnails) — the permission story, and what to do when something looks off.

Window Expansion: the base layer

This is on by default. When your wedge points at an app with two or more windows, hovering it expands an outer arc of pills, one per window. Each pill shows the app icon and a truncated window title. Release on a pill to focus that exact window.

Toggle it under Settings → Menu → Window Expansion → Fan out multi-window apps on hover. Turn it off if you'd rather always focus the front-most window of an app and skip the picker.

One subtle behavior: if an app has only one window, no arc appears — the wedge behaves as a normal launcher. The expansion only triggers at 2+ windows so single-window apps don't waste a tier of motion.

Window Preview: live thumbnails

This is the upgrade. With Window Preview on, those icon+title pills become live thumbnails of each window's contents. You can see which Chrome window has the article you wanted, which Figma file you had open, which Cursor project window you were editing — without having to read the title.

Toggle it under Settings → Menu → Window Expansion → Show live window previews. The first time you turn it on, macOS will prompt for Screen Recording permission. Approve it; that's how the system grants Swik access to render thumbnails of other apps' windows.

Why Screen Recording?

Apple treats any access to other apps' visual contents as a privacy-sensitive operation. Screen Recording is the permission category that covers it. This is the same permission that Loom, CleanShot, ScreenFlow, and Zoom screen-share all require. Swik does not record anything — no video file is created and no data leaves your Mac. It just uses the permission to ask the system "give me a current frame of window X" each time the menu opens.

What happens if you skip the permission?

If you decline Screen Recording when macOS prompts, Swik doesn't break — the toggle simply stays off, and Window Expansion falls back to the icon + title pill view. You still get the multi-window picker; you just don't get thumbnails.

If you change your mind later: System Settings → Privacy & Security → Screen Recording, find Swik, toggle it on. macOS may ask you to quit and relaunch Swik — let it.

Multi-display behavior

The arc renders around the wedge on whatever display the menu was triggered on. If the picked window is on a different display, focusing it will pull that display forward (move your gaze, not your cursor). Swik never silently moves windows between displays — it only changes which window has focus.

If you have two monitors and a window has been off-screen since you unplugged a third, focusing it will put it back where macOS thinks it should be (often the primary). That's a macOS behavior, not a Swik one.

When to leave it off

• You don't grant Screen Recording on principle. Window Expansion alone (icons + titles) is enough for most workflows.
• Performance on older hardware. On 2018-era Intel Macs, capturing thumbnails for a window-heavy app every time the menu opens can show a small lag. The fallback view doesn't.
• You only ever have one window per app open. The arc never appears; the toggle's a no-op for you. Save the permission grant.
• You're on battery and squeezing for power. Thumbnails are cheap, but fallback pills are cheaper.

Troubleshooting