CleanMyMac Vs MacKeeper 2023 – Which Is Best? Let’s Find Out!

As powerful as Apple mac computers are, many users now prefer to use trusted third-party Mac optimization tools to get the best out of their expensive beasts. Among the many such tools, both CleanMyMac vs MacKeeper are regarded as the best of the best – they can free RAM, reclaim storage, fight malware, and more.

But hey, which is the best Mac optimization tool out there?

In many ways, both CleanMyMac & MacKeeper can seem similar, but they are actually very different once you get a closer look. To find the best, let’s compare what each tool offers and match them against one another to find which is worth your wallet;

CleanMyMac Vs MacKeeper – A Brief Overview

Before we take a much closer look at our CleanMyMac X Vs MacKeeper review and what they’ve to offer, let’s enjoy a brief overview of both;

CleanMyMac X – The Reigning Champion!

A fully-fledged mac cleaning tool as well as an anti-malware guard, CleanMyMac has the rare distinction of being “Apple notarized” for safety & reliability. The tool has been created by MacPaw, who are known for their killer Mac utilities like Gemini 2, SetApp, etc., so yeah, it’s pretty popular, now used by over 5 million happy users.

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MacKeeper 5 – A Worthy Opponent

Known for its controversies as much as it’s cleaning Powers, MacKeeper 5 works similarly to CleanMyMac X – it can scan & free storage, optimize RAM, and fight malware. Handy perks like ID theft guard, adware remover, VPN, etc., had further earned itself a lot of fans. The App is AppEsteem certified, so reliability & safety is all but guaranteed.

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MacKeeper Vs CleanMyMac X – The Ultimate Showdown

As you can see, they are both designed to optimize your Mac for maximum performance. However, they both have their own ways (and features) to help realize it. As a consumer, it’s your job to pick the right tool to fix your pricey Mac.

Feeling too daunting to choose? Come, we’ll help you – read on below;

MacKeeper Vs CleanMyMac X – User Experience Review

Yes, CleanMyMac X has a more beautiful interface – no doubt. However, it’s not the easiest UI to get used to quickly. If you are a beginner, you are sure to struggle a bit – at least for a day or two. Once you get past it, though, it’s fairly straightforward. The major features are all categorized (with the results displayed tabbed) on the left pane via a drop-down menu. Click, and they’ll expand on to the main menu where you can engage with it – just like the core macOS UI.

With MacKeeper, we get a more tamed UI. It still a lot similar to CleanMyMac (though not as colorful), but the features are listed in a cleaner, more accessible way. Again, the results like CleanMyMac X are listed in a tabbed interface, namely “Cleaning, Performance, Security, and Privacy. In typical fashion, you can engage with them quite readily.

Snappiness-wise, both app feels buttery smooth and intuitive. The scans are fast, and the results are also easier to deal with thanks to the clean, intuitive UI they both share.

Accuracy & overall intuitiveness

Both apps are quite well versed in detecting junk – and only junk. That said, we CleanMyMac to be slightly better in this regard as it even revealed hidden caches in system folders – something which MacKeeper doesn’t do. Also, if you are not a pro user, MacKeeper can be a bit annoying as it often brings up ads for their pricing plans at almost every turn.

It’s not exactly a deal-breaker, yes but it does somewhat diminishes an otherwise strong, clean user experience.

CleanMyMac OS X Vs MacKeeper 5 – Mac Cleaning Capabilities

As far as de-cluttering your storage from old, obsolete programs abs other junks, both CleanMyMac and MacKeeper 5 does a pretty good job. Both can scan remove junk files such as:

• System log files
• Mac System and user-generated caches
• Language files
• Login items, browsing history, cookies, etc.

Aside from removing all of the above, both CleanMyMac vs MacKeeper can also remove mail attachments and empty your trash. CleanMyMac, in fact, even goes further and keeps a closer eye on your downloads folders, managing it. This is important as this folder is often the largest culprit in keeping old, unneeded files in the system.

Both tools offer 1 click removal, and you also get complete control over which files to delete and which to keep. CleanMyMac, again, has a slight lead in this regard as it breakdown junk files into categories better, so they are easier to deal with. For example, CleanMyMac displays launch agents separately from login items, unlike MacKeeper, which shows it all together.

Duplicate Finder & App Uninstaller

An option for deleting unneeded copies of a file, this feature is only present in MacKeeper, though it’s pretty much useless nowadays. The latest versions of macOS (High Sierra or later) are so smart you can have up to 10+ copies of the same files, and Mac will only store the original core file – thus freeing storage space.

Both CleanMyMac & MacKeeper offer a proper uninstall process to kill apps, they’ll delete the application folder + all residual files in other parts of the system. CleanMyMac slightly excels here as it deletes apps by unused, leftovers, 32-bit.

CleanMyMac x VS MacKeeper Review – Mac Optimization Capabilities

In this particular regard, both CleanMyMac & MacKeeper share the same core feature – free up memory when it’s full. This is useful when you want to run high resource games or video editing software and doesn’t want any slowdowns.

With MacKeeper, however, that’s about it. It doesn’t do anything more to upgrade your system performance.

On the other hand; CleanMyMac offers a plethora of maintenance tasks;

• Running optimization scripts
• Speed up the mail app
• Reindexing macOS’s native spotlight search
• Flush DNS cache
• Repair disk errors, if there is any

Malware/virus removal

Keeping your expensive Mac safe from malware is obviously crucial, and among the two, MacKeeper is the best tool for it. According to an AV-test (a system designed to assess tools a malware detection capabilities): mackeeper scored 85% to an industry standard of 97% in detection rate, which is still pretty outstanding.

CleanMyMac also offers a malware detection tool, but we couldn’t test out how efficient it was since no such tests were conducted.

Exclusive Features Analyzed – The Highlights

As you saw, though they share the same goals, both CleanMyMac and mackeeper are built differently. And this also means they have certain features unique to them;

CleanMyMac X

Space lens – offers a visual representation of which folders taking up the most amount of space. You can zoom in to see the contents like on a map.

Shredder: This is great for those who work with sensitive documents, as it helps files be deleted beyond the point of recovery.

CleanMyMac Menu – this is a background service that’s accessible from the Apple menu bar at the top of the screen. It contains a list of key diagnostic tools such as RAM, CPU, battery, network usage, and connectivity.

MacKeeper 5

TrackMyMac – if the name doesn’t give it away, this feature allows your Mac to be tracked should it get stolen.

StopAd- this is a handy ad-blocking extension for chrome and safari. We tested it out on both, and it works relatively well.

Private connect – this is a built-in VPN with all the VPN-isque benefits.

ID theft guard – this feature will alert you if anybody is trying to steal your ID on the web. To use it, you need to, however, share your data with MacKeeper.

CleanMyMac X Vs MacKeeper 5 – The Pricing Conundrum

Pricing can make or break a product, and in the case of CleanMyMac and MacKeeper, this fact is more apparent than ever before;

In any way you slice it, MacKeeper is expensive. If you take a monthly subscription, it’s $14.95 a month or a wallet-shattering $179.40 per year. If you choose to pay for a year at a time, you can get it down to $9.95 a month, translating to $119.40 a month. Granted, they run discounts quite often. Still, it’s an expensive proposition nonetheless.

With CleanMyMac, you get a more palatable one-time payment of just $39.95 a month. You can also get up to 5 licenses together to slice off 55% from the original pricing – this is brilliant if you are going to use it in a business setting. There is also s free version available, but it can only clean 500MB from the system at a time.

So yeah, as far as pricing goes, the choice is clear: CleanMyMac has won this round hands down!

Which Is Better: CleanMyMac vs MacKeeper 5 – The Conclusion

As you just witnessed in our CleanMyMac vs Mackeeper comparison, both tools are more than capable when it comes to managing, cleaning, and optimizing mac computers – you simply can’t go wrong with either of them, honestly speaking.

But hey, in every comparison, there has to be a winner. So if we have to make a choice, then our pick will be none other than CleanMyMac. Don’t get us wrong: MacKeeper is pretty good at optimizing/enhancing Macs – excellent, in fact. However, we are still not 100% sold on the idea of offering control of our very costly software that’s once been accused of being a Scam – even if that’s not the case anymore.

CleanMyMac X, on the other hand, has a clean past, a robust infrastructure, and features that actually make a difference in day to day Mac usage. Besides, it also costs a fair bit less than its rival by a fair margin – it’s a no-brainer.

So yeah, that’s our answer; CleanMyMac is the best Mac cleaner out now, period!

Hey, satisfied with the results? Think otherwise? Let us know in the comments. Also, if found useful, share this article with your friends & colleagues so they too may benefit.