Sunburn
Push your Mac beyond bright.
A tiny menu bar app that leverages Extended Dynamic Range to push your display past its normal brightness limits.
macOS 13+ · Apple Silicon · Free
Features
Engineered for intensity
EDR Brightness Boost
Push your display up to 2x its standard brightness using your screen's Extended Dynamic Range headroom.
One-Click Toggle
Lives in your menu bar. Flip the toggle on, drag the slider, done. No windows, no clutter.
Flicker-Free
Smoothly adapts to ambient light changes without tearing down the overlay. No flashing, ever.
Metal-Powered
Built on Apple's Metal framework with a hardware-accelerated overlay. Near-zero CPU overhead.
Under the hood
How it works
Reads your display's EDR ceiling
Sunburn queries macOS for your screen's maximum Extended Dynamic Range value — the hidden headroom your display has above standard brightness.
Creates an invisible Metal overlay
A hardware-accelerated Metal view renders in extended linear sRGB color space with values above 1.0, telling your display to output light beyond its normal SDR white point.
Multiplies brightness in real-time
The overlay uses a "multiply" compositing filter, amplifying the entire screen's brightness while preserving colors and contrast. You control the intensity with a simple slider.
Get started
Installation
Download the DMG
Click "Download Sunburn" to get the disk image. Your browser may warn you — this is normal for apps outside the App Store.
Open & drag to Applications
Double-click the DMG to mount it. Drag the Sunburn icon into the Applications folder shortcut.
Allow Sunburn to run
macOS may block the first launch. Open System Settings → Privacy & Security, scroll down and click "Open Anyway" next to the Sunburn message. Alternatively, right-click the app → Open → Open.
Ready to turn it up?
Sunburn is free and works on any Mac with macOS 13 or later. No account needed.
Download Sunburn