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Forkbench docs

Everything you need to get from "downloaded" to "shipping". Cmd-F is your friend.

Install the Mac app

Download the latest signed build from /download/latest. macOS will ask for permission to open the app the first time — that's expected; the app is notarized by Apple.

Minimum macOS: the Hero on the home page lists the current floor — check there before installing on an older Mac.
Updates: Forkbench ships its own auto- updater. You don't need to come back to this site to upgrade.
Older versions: see the changelog for direct links.

You don't need an account to use the free tier. You only need one to subscribe to Pro or to sync state across devices.

Go to /login — Google, Apple, or email/password all work.
First-time sign-up with email sends a verification link. The link is good for 60 minutes.
Forgot your password? Reset it. The reset email arrives within a minute; check spam if not.

Pair the Mac app with your account

Sign in on the web, then open Account → Devices and click "Generate pairing code". You'll see a 6-character code valid for 5 minutes.

In the Mac app's settings, paste the code into the "Pair this device" field.
The Mac app trades the code for a long-lived token — you won't have to do this again on that machine.
Lose your laptop? Revoke any paired device from the same Devices page.
How many devices: Pro covers up to 10 paired devices — comfortably your own Macs. It's a single-user plan, so one subscription isn't meant to cover a whole team; Team is for that.

Forkbench Pro is $12/month, with a 14-day free trial. It's the one paid plan, and it starts with persistent memory for your agents. See the full pricing page for what's in free vs. paid.

Click Subscribe on /pricing. We hand off to our payment provider — your card never touches our servers.
Manage your subscription, update card, or cancel from Account → Billing. The cancel takes effect at the end of the current period.
Receipts arrive from our payment provider. Need a custom invoice? Email [email protected].

How it works

Forkbench runs coding agents in terminal tabs and gives them a shared place to work. The pieces below fit together: a Thread is one unit of work, Collabs shares it across your devices, and the Notebooks and Vault decide what your agents are allowed to read and use.

Threads

A Thread is one workspace: a folder, its terminal tabs, and a single goal. Open more than one tab in a Thread to run several agents at once on the same goal.

Agents don't chat. They coordinate through a shared goal and a task backlog: each agent claims tasks, marks them done, and leaves progress the others can see. There is no lead and no group chat, just the board.
Enroll an agent by dragging its terminal tab onto the Thread's row in the sidebar. Every enrolled agent shares the Thread's goal, backlog, and the notes and secrets you grant.
Local by default. A Thread lives on one Mac until you promote it to Collabs.

Collabs

Promoting a Thread to Collabs syncs it across every device on your account. The goal, the task backlog, and the live agents show up on each device and in Fork Lab. Collabs is a Pro feature.

Create one from a Thread's overview, then name it. The name is account-scoped; the Thread itself stays local and freely renamed.
Join a Collab Thread shared from another device using the join button in the threads sidebar. It arrives as a new Thread bound to the shared goal and backlog.
Withdraw drops a Thread back to local-only without deleting the Collab Thread. Your other devices keep collaborating, and you can reconnect the Thread later by re-adding it.

How agents collaborate

Inside a Thread, agents follow a small set of rules so several of them (on one Mac or across Collab Threads) can work the same goal without stepping on each other.

One goal. An agent sets the Thread's goal. Later changes are proposed, and you accept or reject them from the Thread overview.
A shared backlog. Agents break the goal into tasks and keep adding tasks as the work reveals new pieces. A task can wait on another, and only becomes ready once what it waits on is done.
Claim, work, complete. An agent claims a ready task, works it, leaves progress on it, and marks it done, then takes the next one. When there is no ready work, it keeps listening rather than stopping.
You're on the board too. You can add tasks, comment, and @-mention an agent. When every task the goal needs is done, an agent proposes the goal complete and you confirm, which stands the agents down.

Notebooks & grants

The Notebooks is your account-wide memory for agents: notes (individual briefs) grouped into notebooks (folders), synced across your devices. Agents keep conventions, decisions, and plans here instead of relearning them every session.

Private by default. Agents in a Thread see none of your Notebooks until you grant a note or notebook to that Thread.
Read or read-write. Read lets an agent read a note; read-write also lets it edit. Grant a whole notebook to cover notes you add to it later.
Per Thread. Grants are set per Thread, so each piece of work exposes only the notes it needs.

Vault & grants

The Vault holds secrets (API keys, tokens, passwords) safely stored locally. Grant a secret to a Thread to let its agents use it, for example run a command with an API key, without ever seeing the value. The value never enters the conversation.

Use, never see. Agents run commands through a broker that injects the secret at the moment of use; the value is never shown to them and never written to disk in the clear.
Standing or just-in-time. A standing secret can be used freely while it's granted to a Thread; a just-in-time secret asks you to approve every use with Touch ID.
Per Thread, device-local. Like notes, secrets are granted per Thread and stay on the device that holds them, unless you forward one (end-to-end encrypted) to another of your devices.

Fork Lab

Fork Lab is the web view of your Collabs. Check a goal, watch the backlog, and read what your agents are doing from any browser, without leaving your desk.

A message you send from the web attaches to the matching conversation already open on your Mac and brings it forward. It never spawns an agent off-screen, so remote work is always something you can see.
Fork Lab only ever shows Collabs you've shared. A local Thread stays on your Mac.

Troubleshooting

The Mac app says "not signed in" after pairing

Pairing codes expire after 5 minutes. Generate a new one and try again. If it still fails, sign out of the Mac app fully (Settings → Sign out) and re-pair.

Signed in on the web but the nav still says "Sign in"

A stale tab. Refresh the page — the marketing nav reads your session on every server render, so a hard reload always recovers.

The "Manage subscription" button errors

The provider portal session is short-lived; if you opened it once and came back, click the button again. Still failing? Email [email protected] with your account email and we'll send a direct portal link.

FAQ

Does Forkbench send my code anywhere?

No. Forkbench is local-first — your repos and shell history stay on your machine. Only billing + account state goes to our servers. See Privacy for the full picture.

Can I get a refund?

Email [email protected] within 14 days of the charge and we'll refund, no questions. After 14 days we look at it case-by-case.

How many devices can I use Pro on?

Up to 10 paired devices — enough for any one person's Macs. Pro is a single-user plan: it's fine on all of your machines, but one subscription isn't meant to cover a whole team. Notebooks storage and Fork Lab relay are generous, with light fair-use limits only to stop automated abuse — see Terms for the details.

Is there a team / enterprise plan?

Team is here — shared notes and managed per-seat billing for a whole team. Want it sooner? Email [email protected] with your seat count and we'll line you up.

Still stuck?

Contact lists every email route. We answer.