kageroumado Releases Phosphene, Bringing Custom Video Wallpapers to the macOS Desktop and Lock Screen

On May 21, 2026, kageroumado released Phosphene 1.0, a free and open-source application that turns any video into a live wallpaper for both the desktop and the lock screen on macOS 26 Tahoe.

macOS includes animated wallpapers such as Apple's Aerials, but offers no way to add personal videos. Phosphene integrates with the same system wallpaper mechanism Apple's own wallpapers use, which kageroumado reverse engineered from the private WallpaperExtensionKit framework. As a result, user videos appear in System Settings under Wallpaper, in the same picker as Apple's collection, and reach the lock screen, which window-based wallpaper apps cannot do.

Phosphene plays any video format the Mac can decode, including MP4, MOV, HEVC, H.264 and ProRes, with frame-accurate gapless looping. Selections can differ per display and per Space. Playback is power-aware: it pauses or reduces work on battery, when the screen dims, when windows cover the desktop, under thermal pressure and during Game Mode, and it stops entirely after 30 seconds of inactivity.

Key features

• Any video as desktop and lock screen wallpaper
• Chosen from System Settings, alongside Apple's Aerials
• Per-display and per-Space selection
• Frame-accurate gapless looping
• Power-aware playback on battery, occlusion and thermals

Availability

Phosphene is available now as a free download from kagerou.glass/phosphene and GitHub. It requires macOS 26 Tahoe and runs on Apple silicon and Intel Macs. The source code is published under the MIT License.