Where it stands · updated 28 August
There is now an installer, and it works. A clean install was built and started from nothing for the first time on 24 August — it found four faults, which are fixed. So this is real, and you could be running it this week.
It now sizes itself to your Mac. The installer reads how much memory and which chip you have, asks you two questions, and recommends an assistant that will actually feel pleasant on your machine rather than the largest one that technically fits. You can overrule it.
But it is not one click. You run a script in Terminal, it downloads the assistant you chose — anywhere from 5 GB to 45, depending — and afterwards you grant some macOS permissions by hand, because macOS won't let any installer do that part for you. Call it half an hour, most of it waiting.
If a Terminal window is a reason to say no, that's a completely fair answer, and I'd rather have it now than in a fortnight.
What it is
In one paragraph
Four things in one place, on your own Mac: a health record, a journal, your own book library, and an on-board AI. It reads whatever your watch and scale already write to Apple Health and tells you what actually happened — in sentences, not scores. Nothing is uploaded. There is no account, because there is no server.
That fourth one deserves more than a mention, because it isn't obvious what it means. If you've come across the videos about running your own AI at home — this is one of those, arriving by the side door. On-board means exactly that: the language model sits on your disk and answers there, and it works in two rooms.
It also does things, not just answers. Ask, and it will set a reminder, add a calendar event, write a note or a journal entry, log a measurement, open a document or draft an email — in your own Mac's Calendar, Reminders, Notes and Mail. It shows you a card first and nothing happens until you tap it, and it is never permitted to tell you it did something it did not do.
No subscription, nothing counted, no account, and both keep working with the internet switched off entirely. Every size does this — the larger ones simply think better about what they find, which is what the sizes further down are about.
And the honest limit: it is not as clever as Claude or ChatGPT, and it won't be. Those run in buildings full of machines. Ask this one to untangle something genuinely hard and it will lose the thread sooner. What you get instead is an assistant that has read your books and your history, costs nothing to ask, and never sends a word of it anywhere. For most of what you'd want day to day, that trade is a good one — and for the rest, the cloud is still there.
Check this first
Will it run on your Mac?
One question saves us both a week. If the answer is no here, stop — the rest doesn't matter.
| Minimum | Recommended | |
|---|---|---|
| Processor | Apple silicon — M1 or later | any Apple silicon |
| Memory | 16 GB | 24 GB |
| Free space | 15 GB | 50 GB |
| macOS | 13 Ventura or later | current |
Intel Macs will not work. The assistant runs on your own machine, and without Apple silicon it's too slow to be worth your time. On 8 GB it would start and then disappoint you. Better to know now than after a 5 GB download.
You'll also need an iPhone — Apple Health is the doorway your readings come through. Beyond that, the Lodge shows a gauge for everything it can read, so any you have no device for — a blood pressure cuff, a glucose monitor — simply sit empty until you do. Nothing is hidden from you.
If your Mac has more
The table above is the floor, not the ceiling.
The assistant lives on your machine, so your Mac decides what it can be — and two different things decide it. How much memory you have decides which sizes fit. Which chip you have decides how fast they write: a Max moves memory about twice as quickly as a Pro, and an Ultra twice again — which is why two Macs with the same 64 GB can be twice as far apart in speed.
So it takes both to answer. Tell me yours and I'll show you what you'd get.
Not sure? Apple menu → About This Mac tells you both. Pick them and I'll show you which size you'd get, and how fast it would write.
Because of that, a larger size isn't automatically a slower one. On a Pro chip, stepping up to Extra large roughly halves your speed for a modest gain — worth it to some people, not to others. On an Ultra it barely slows it at all, which is why the recommendation changes there.
The installer looks at your Mac, asks you a couple of questions, and recommends a size with these numbers in front of you — and you can overrule it. It won't hand you the smallest one just because it fits.
Two ways in
You can start this week, or wait a few weeks. Both are fine by me.
Today the Lodge collects its readings through an app called Health Auto Export. I'm replacing it with my own — that work is underway — and which route suits you just depends on whether you'd rather begin now or hold on.
And to be plain about it: I'd honestly rather you waited than spent anything. You're offering to do me a favour by testing this. Being asked to buy something first is the wrong way round, and I'm not going to dress it up to get a tester a fortnight sooner.
Known and unfixed
What's rough
I'd rather you heard this from me than discovered it.
- Your Mac has to be awake to receive readings. It's a local application; nothing waits in a cloud for you. There's a setting for it and the guide shows you. The iPhone app I'm building will hold your readings and deliver them when your Mac next wakes, which settles it properly — and that's exactly why there are two ways in: start now with Health Auto Export, or wait a few weeks and skip it entirely.
- Setup is not one click. Terminal, a large download, permissions by hand.
- It's built around how I live — long walks, fasting, a lot of writing. If your life looks different, some of it will read oddly, and that's exactly what I want to know.
The part that matters
What would actually help
Not a bug list — I can find bugs. What I can't see from here is how it lands on someone who didn't build it.
Your side of it
I can't see your data — and that has a consequence
Everything stays on your machine. That isn't a policy I could quietly change; there's no server for it to arrive at. It also means I have no telemetry, no crash reports, and no way to look at what happened to you.
So I depend on what you tell me, rather more than most software would. If you send me a screenshot, glance at what's in it first — it will be your real readings.
Saying yes
Write to me, or just keep an eye on it.
It's me answering, not a support desk. Tell me what Mac you have and what you wear, and I'll tell you honestly whether it's worth your time yet.
No list to unsubscribe from, because there isn't a list — it's a person with an inbox. If you ask to be kept posted, you'll hear from me when there's something worth your time, and not otherwise.