Cloak vs FaceGate: Which Mac App Locker Should You Use?

FaceGate and Cloak both stop an app from opening on your Mac until you prove it is you. They are built for different people. FaceGate is free, open source, and unlocks with your face. Cloak is paid, and covers apps, folders and files with encryption behind the lock.

What each one protects

FaceGate locks apps. When a locked app launches, FaceGate stops it and asks for your face, Touch ID or a PIN. The app and its data stay on disk as they are.

Cloak locks apps the same way, with Touch ID or a password. It also hides apps, and a hidden app is moved into an encrypted image, so it is gone from the Dock, Launchpad, Spotlight and the Applications folder. And it locks folders and single files, encrypted in place with AES-256, hidden until you unlock them.

Unlocking

FaceGate’s face unlock is its reason to exist. It works on device, with the face data encrypted and stored locally. It is also the source of most of its support issues: camera not detected, the liveness head turn, the prompt showing up when you did not ask for it.

Cloak does not use the camera to let you in. Touch ID or a password. The camera is only used, if you turn it on, to photograph someone who fails.

The Mac password question

FaceGate uses its own PIN, so your Mac login does not open it.

Cloak lets your Mac password work as a fallback by default, because that is what most people expect. If people around you know that password, you turn the fallback off in Settings and set a Cloak password. From then on only your fingerprint or that password opens anything.

Quitting and tampering

Both need authentication to quit. FaceGate also makes its app bundle immutable so it cannot be casually deleted, and it ships an emergency kill hotkey that you can disable. Cloak relaunches itself if it is killed, and because hidden apps and locked folders are encrypted, removing Cloak does not expose them.

Install

FaceGate is not notarized by Apple. You install it with a script or Homebrew and click through a macOS warning. Cloak is signed and notarized and installs from a DMG like any other Mac app.

Side by side

	Cloak	FaceGate
Price	$9.99 once	Free
Touch ID	Yes	Yes
Face unlock	No	Yes
Locks apps	Yes	Yes
Hides apps	Yes	No
Locks folders and files	Yes	No
Encrypts	Yes	No
Intruder photo	Yes	No
Mac password shut out	Your choice	Yes
Auth to quit	Yes	Yes
Notarized install	Yes	No
Offline, no account	Yes	Yes
Minimum macOS	13	14

Checked 10 September 2026.

The verdict

FaceGate’s one advantage is face unlock, and it is free. Everything else in the table above goes to Cloak: folders and files, encryption behind the lock, an intruder photo, the Mac password switch, and a normal install. If you are leaving FaceGate for a specific reason, FaceGate alternative goes through each one.