Pace vs Impulse

Choosing between Pace and Impulse?

Impulse is local-by-default, cloud when you ask, and it's open source under a Apache-2.0 license. It calls itself "Native macOS assistant — sees, hears, remembers your projects.".

Where Pace differs: Pace's memory is conversation-wide two-tier (verbatim K=4 + rolling summary) with cross-quit persistence. Impulse's is per-project SwiftData. Pace adds actions, MCP, and a tier picker; Impulse is more focused on project-scoped chat.

The full breakdown is below — what Impulse is genuinely good at, its stack, and the honest line on where Pace diverges, including where Pace is behind. For the whole field in one place, see every macOS voice agent compared.

Impulse

github.com/section9-lab/Impulse

Native macOS assistant — sees, hears, remembers your projects. — section9-lab

STT · Speech framework (on-device) Reasoner · Any OpenAI-compatible / Ollama / LM Studio TTS · Local Screen · yes

What it's good at

  • Per-project SwiftData memory — conversations scoped to the project you're working in.
  • JSONL session logs that are diffable and greppable.
  • Vision framework OCR on-device; security-scoped bookmarks for sandboxed file access.
  • Tool calls are visible in chat before they run.

Where Pace differs

Pace's memory is conversation-wide two-tier (verbatim K=4 + rolling summary) with cross-quit persistence. Impulse's is per-project SwiftData. Pace adds actions, MCP, and a tier picker; Impulse is more focused on project-scoped chat.

Rechecked June 2026.
If Impulse shipped something I missed or got cheaper since, email me and I'll update this page.

Pace is $29 once, fully on-device, and free to try on Apple Intelligence.

Get Pace

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