Neru

Navigate your entire screen without touching the mouse.

Built for the person who already remapped Caps Lock.

Free and open-source. No subscription. No trial. No catch.

macOS	Linux	Windows
Full featured ✅	Basic support 🔵	Not yet supported 🔲

練る (neru) — "to refine through practice." The more you use it, the faster you get.

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If you use Vimium in the browser, you already know what this feels like. Neru brings that to your entire operating system — every app, every window, every menu bar item. Navigate with labels, grids, or vim-style keys. Click, right-click, drag, scroll, select text — all without leaving your keyboard.

Here's the whole flow:

Cmd+Shift+Space   →  labels appear on every clickable element
type the label    →  cursor jumps there
Shift+L           →  left click

The mouse is now optional.

Unlike most tools in this space, Neru is CLI-first — every action is a command, every setting is a plain toml file, everything is scriptable. No settings panel. No GUI preferences window. It lives in your dotfiles like it was always supposed to be there.

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See it in action — recursive grid mode in real use:

demo.mp4

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Install

brew tap y3owk1n/tap
brew install --cask y3owk1n/tap/neru

Grant Accessibility in System Settings → Privacy & Security → Accessibility, then:

Press Cmd+Shift+Space. Labels appear. You're already using it.

Other options (Nix flake, build from source) → Installation Guide

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Pick your mode

Four modes, one tool — mix and match as the situation calls for it.

Recursive Grid · start here

Grid

Hints (AX + Vision OCR)

Mode	Hotkey	How it works	Best for
Recursive Grid ⭐	Cmd+Shift+C	Divides screen into cells; narrow down with home-row keys	Everything — any app, canvas, or game
Hints	Cmd+Shift+Space	Labels every clickable element via Accessibility API or Vision OCR	Native apps, Electron (VS Code, Slack), Figma
Grid	Cmd+Shift+G	Jump directly to a cell by row + column label	Fast coarse movement across large monitors
Scroll	Cmd+Shift+S	Vim-style j/k scrolling, u/d for half pages	Reading docs and code without lifting your hands

All bindings are fully remappable — Colemak, Dvorak, whatever you're on. → Configuration Guide

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CLI-first, by design

Most tools in this space are GUI apps with a settings panel. Neru is the opposite — the CLI is the interface, and config is a file you own.

neru hints          # trigger hints mode
neru grid           # trigger grid mode
neru recursive_grid # trigger recursive grid mode
neru scroll         # trigger scroll mode
neru config reload  # hot-reload config without restarting
neru status         # check daemon state and permissions

Config lives at ~/.config/neru/config.toml — plain text, version-controllable, and hot-reloadable. Every action is available over IPC, so Neru composes naturally with skhd, Raycast, Alfred, Hammerspoon, or any shell script. If it can run a command, it can drive Neru.

neru config init      # generate a fully-commented starter config
neru config validate  # check for errors before applying
neru config reload    # apply changes without restarting

→ CLI Guide · Configuration Guide · Config Showcases

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What people are saying

"neru: the ACTUAL BEST app for ditching mouse"

Watch the author run their entire daily workflow without touching the mouse → HOW-I-USE-NERU.md

Got questions or want to share your setup? Join the Discord →

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Neru Dojo — build your muscle memory 🥋

The community built a browser-based training game to help you get fast with recursive grid and hints. Practice target acquisition, sharpen your reaction time, get reps in before it clicks.

👉 Play Neru Dojo — no install, works in any browser.

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How Neru compares

Tool	Approach	Price	Open Source
Neru	Grid + Recursive Grid + AX Hints + Vision OCR	Free	✅
Homerow	AX-Tree Hints	Paid	❌
Wooshy	AX-Tree Search-to-click	Paid	❌
Mouseless	Grid pointer control	Paid	❌
Scoot	AX Hints + Grid	Free	✅
Glyphlow	Hints + vim text editing	Free	✅
Stochos	Keyboard driven mouse control	Free	✅
Vimac	AX Hints	Free	✅ (unmaintained)
warpd	Grid + Hints + Normal Pointer	Free	✅

More modes, more engines, more platforms — and it's free. If you've been paying for any of the tools above, Neru is worth 10 minutes of your time.

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Platform support

Capability	macOS	Linux	Windows
Recursive Grid	✅	✅	🔲
Grid	✅	✅	🔲
Vim-Style Scroll	✅	✅	🔲
Hints (Accessibility API)	✅	🔲	🔲
Hints (Vision OCR)	✅	🔲	🔲
Direct Mouse Injection	✅	✅	🔲
Global Hotkeys	✅	✅	🔲
Native Overlays	✅	✅	🔲

→ Roadmap · Cross-platform details

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Documentation

Everything you need to go deep:

Guide	What's in it
Installation	Homebrew, Nix, source, permissions, launchd
CLI	Every command and flag
Configuration	Keybindings, themes, overlays, all settings
Tips & Tricks	Power-user patterns and setups
Troubleshooting	Common issues and fixes
Roadmap	What's coming
Contributing	PRs and bug reports

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Contributing

Neru is written in Go and Objective-C with a clean, modular structure — adding a new feature or platform adapter is straightforward. Pull requests are very welcome.

git checkout -b feature/your-feature
just test && just lint
# open a pull request

→ Development Guide · Coding Standards

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Support the project

Neru is built and maintained by one person, entirely in spare time. If it's earned a place in your workflow, a sponsorship goes a long way:

👉 GitHub Sponsors

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License

MIT — see LICENSE.

Stop reaching for the mouse. It takes one command.

brew install --cask y3owk1n/tap/neru

Welcome to the mouseless life.

Made with ❤️ by y3owk1n