Keep AWDL paused while you play, with latency readings you can inspect.
event-driven protection •
macOS 13+ •
Intel and Apple silicon •
signed and notarized
Website • Install • Pricing • How it works • Control Center • Privacy • Documentation • Build
Ping Warden (formerly AWDL Control) is a Mac app for controlling Apple Wireless Direct Link during latency-sensitive games and calls. It keeps the interface paused while protection is active and displays latency, jitter and probe history so you can assess your connection. You can control it from the menu bar or a native Control Center toggle on macOS 26 and later.
Ping Protection watches Apple Wireless Direct Link (AWDL), the interface used by AirDrop, AirPlay, Handoff, and other nearby-device features, and keeps that interface down while it is active. The prebuilt app requires a one-time $15 license to enable Ping Protection, including starting a protected Latency Session. Eligible existing users receive the 90-day transition described below. Visit pingwarden.app for the product website and complete documentation.
Ping Protection temporarily makes AirDrop, AirPlay, Handoff, and other AWDL-dependent features unavailable on your Mac. Turn protection off when you need them, or use the 10-minute pause from the menu bar. Ping Warden restores AWDL when protection stops and during its removal flow.
Turn protection on for the session that needs it, then restore nearby-device features when you finish.
A one-time command can lower awdl0, but macOS can bring it back up. Ping Warden watches interface events for reactivation and keeps the current protection state visible, so you can control that behavior for a gaming session.
Ping Warden uses a privileged helper that waits for kernel route and interface events. When macOS tries to raise awdl0 while Ping Protection is on, the helper attempts to lower it and increments an intervention counter. That count records attempts, not confirmed blocks or measured spikes prevented. The dashboard puts the counter next to live latency, jitter, probe failures, and history so you can compare the readings on your own network.
On macOS Tahoe 26 or later, Ping Protection is also a native Control Center control. Open Control Center, click Edit Controls, and add Ping Protection. You can drag it to the menu bar too, next to Wi-Fi and Sound. The toggle reflects whether protection is actually on, including when Game Mode or a Latency Session turned it on.
To keep one icon instead of two, turn on Settings → General → Control Center Only (Settings → Automation in 4.3.0). The toggle then replaces Ping Warden's menu bar icon. Open Ping Warden from Applications or Spotlight whenever you need settings. Version 4.2.1 and earlier offer Hide Menu Bar Icon instead, which keeps the Dock icon. That choice carries over until you change it. The control needs a signed release build, and turning protection on still requires a license or an active transition.
Download the signed, notarized DMG from Releases. Open it, drag Ping Warden to /Applications, and launch that copy. The dashboard, latency history, diagnostics and updates work without a key.
Enabling Ping Protection, including starting a Latency Session, requires a Gumroad license or an active existing-user transition. The purchase includes the same app download and a license key. An official build accepts a key purchased later.
On version 2.0.5 or earlier? Download the current version once. Early builds either lack an updater or have incomplete updater configuration. Quit Ping Warden, download the latest DMG, and replace the copy in Applications. Launch it from Applications afterward.
On a later version? Choose Check for Updates from the menu bar icon. If no update appears or installation fails, use the same manual download. Before 4.1.6, automatic checks could depend on helper approval. Version 4 asks you to accept the licensing change before an in-app upgrade. Eligible existing users receive a 90-day transition, starting at their first launch of version 4 with protection enabled and the helper approved. See updating from an earlier version.
Open Settings → License and enter the key from your receipt. The app verifies once with Gumroad and then works offline for up to 14 days. That pane also shows the deadline if you have an active transition. Existing users and pre-version-4 donors should read Pricing first, since you may not need to buy anything yet.
The welcome appears automatically once. Choose Not Now to use the free dashboard and finish setup later.
In the welcome window, click Turn On Ping Protection after activation. Before activation, the same window leads with Open Dashboard and offers Set Up Ping Protection. If you already closed it, choose Finish Setup… from the menu bar icon or Settings → General. When macOS shows Background Items Added, turn on Ping Warden under Allow in the Background in System Settings → General → Login Items & Extensions. This one-time approval lets the helper keep awdl0 down. The helper changes nothing else, accepts requests only from Ping Warden, and never connects to the internet. The Setup Guide walks through each screen.
Setup turns Ping Protection on when it finishes. Later, use the menu bar or the Control Center toggle to turn it on or off. Without a key (and outside the transition window) the app points you back to Settings → License instead of turning protection on. The menu should read Status: Protected, and the Dashboard should show a Turn Off button. The dashboard shows live latency and counts the helper's intervention attempts when macOS reactivates AWDL.
The Quick Start guide covers first-run setup and the optional automation features.
| Feature | What it does |
|---|---|
| Ping Protection | Keeps awdl0 down with an event-driven privileged helper |
| Live dashboard | Tracks latency, jitter, probe failures, history, and helper interventions |
| Game Mode auto-detect | Turns protection on when a recognized game is the frontmost app, with no permission needed; optional Screen Recording access also catches fullscreen games behind other windows |
| Quick pause | Restores nearby-device features for 10 minutes, then returns to your previous protection state |
| Control Center toggle | Turns protection on or off from Control Center or the menu bar on macOS 26 or newer, and can replace Ping Warden's own menu bar icon |
| Diagnostics export | Creates a local support snapshot that you can review before sharing |
| Automatic updates | Uses Sparkle and signed update metadata to deliver new releases |
Apple added third-party Mac controls to Control Center in macOS Tahoe 26, which is why the toggle has a newer requirement than the rest of the app.
Ping targets include common public services, discovered GeForce NOW regions, your network gateway, and targets you add yourself.
Ping Warden stays open source under MIT. You can build from source, inspect it, and modify it under MIT whether you pay or not. The prebuilt, signed, and notarized app is free to download. The dashboard, latency history, diagnostics, and updates are free to use.
Enabling Ping Protection in the prebuilt app, including starting a Latency Session, requires a license or an active transition. Buy the license at Gumroad. The price is $15 in USD, plus VAT or sales tax where applicable. One key works on the Macs you own. The app verifies once with Gumroad, then re-checks roughly every 6 hours while it runs and once at launch; verification is offline-friendly for up to 14 days.
Transition for existing users: If protection was enabled with an approved helper when you first launched version 4, it remains available for 90 days from that launch. Updates preserve the original deadline. Check the time remaining in Settings → License. When the transition ends, enter a license key to keep protection available. The app introduces the transition once and reminds eligible users twice more, when 30 days and 7 days remain, showing the days left. Reminders are held while a detected game or latency session is active, appear the next time you use Ping Warden, and stop after license activation. A reminder missed while the app was closed does not stack with the next one.
Donors: If you supported Ping Warden through Buy Me a Coffee before version 4, email oliver@ames.consulting with your receipt and it will be honored as a full license.
| Setting | Location | Behavior |
|---|---|---|
| Ping Protection | Menu bar or Control Center | Requests AWDL protection when licensing and helper approval permit it. |
| Quick pause | Menu bar | Restores AWDL for 10 minutes, then returns to the previous protection state. |
| Game Mode auto-detect | Settings | Uses frontmost-game detection. Optional Screen Recording permission adds fullscreen detection behind other windows. |
| Control Center Only | Settings > General | Hides the app's menu bar and Dock icons on supported Macs. Direct launch opens Settings. |
| License | Settings > License | Activates a key and shows any existing-user transition deadline. |
| Crash reporting | Settings > Advanced > Privacy | Defaults on when no choice is saved. A saved opt-out persists. |
Latency history, protection state, settings, and intervention counts stay on your Mac. Ping Warden doesn't send usage analytics.
The app makes a few narrow outbound requests:
- Sparkle checks the public appcast for updates.
- License activation and refresh send your license key and the product ID to Gumroad over HTTPS. Your key stays in the macOS Keychain between checks.
- The dashboard checks
status.geforcenow.comto discover GeForce NOW target hostnames. - Anonymous crash and error reporting has been on by default since version 4.2.0 when no choice has been saved. Updates preserve your saved choice, including an opt-out. Turn it off under Settings > Advanced > Privacy to stop reporting immediately. The only thing sent after you turn it off is one record that the current app session ended. Turning it back on takes effect after a relaunch. The next section lists exactly what it sends.
- TCP latency probes connect only to the target you select or ask Ping Warden to choose.
Diagnostics exports are written locally. Ping Warden never uploads them for you.
Reports go to Sentry. Ping Warden decides what goes in each one from a fixed list, rather than trying to spot and remove sensitive text:
- Crash reports and uncaught exceptions: the exception type, how the crash happened, and the stack of each thread. Each stack frame keeps its function name and the memory addresses of code needed to match it to Ping Warden's debug symbols, and its file path is cut down to its place inside Ping Warden.app, a macOS system path such as /System/Library/..., or just the file name. Exception messages, thread names, the processor register values saved at the moment of the crash, source code lines, and any other text the reporting library collects are removed before the report leaves your Mac.
- Helper error events when setup, Repair, or turning protection on or off fails, or when the helper stops answering. Ping Warden builds these itself from a fixed set of values: the problem's name, the helper's registration state, a system error domain and numeric code, the app version, and the macOS version. It sends at most one event per problem every 30 minutes, even if you relaunch, and no more than ten per app run.
- Session counts for each release: when the app starts, when it quits, and whether it crashed. Sentry's library ties these to a random identifier it creates for this installation, which is how crash-free rates are counted.
- A short trail of app state changes attached to those reports, such as "setup started" or "protection enabled."
- Counts of reports the library dropped and why, for example because of a rate limit, with nothing from the reports themselves.
- On every report: the app version and build, the macOS version and build, and the Mac's model and processor architecture. Everything else the library would attach, including your locale, time zone, memory size, and your Mac's name, is removed.
Ping Warden never puts ping targets, host names, IP addresses, Wi-Fi network names, license keys, your Mac's name, or diagnostics exports in a report. It turns off the reporting library's default personal data, performance tracing, network request tracking, and automatic interface breadcrumbs. The Sentry project is also set not to store the IP address a report arrives from.
Buying a license is the most direct way to support the work, and it is what unlocks Ping Protection in the prebuilt app. See Pricing for the terms, the existing-user transition, and the donor path.
- Documentation website includes the complete guides below, pricing, privacy, and release notes.
- Quick Start covers installation and first-run setup.
- Full documentation explains the architecture, settings, and operating model.
- Troubleshooting provides safe recovery steps and diagnostic commands.
- Release notes record changes by version.
- GitHub Issues is the place to report a reproducible problem or request a feature.
git clone https://github.com/oliverames/ping-warden.git
cd ping-warden
swift test
open PingWarden/PingWarden.xcodeprojThe app requires macOS 13 or newer. Configure signing for the app, helper, and widget targets before running from Xcode. The full helper-registration flow only works when the built app is installed in /Applications; non-helper UI work can run from Xcode.
The project declares 4.4.0 (44000). The developer-account migration remains paused. Its preparation was reverted from the current main source in 273e26c and is preserved on migration/paused-developer-account, with a dedicated worktree recorded in WORKLOG.md. The historical preparation commits remain in Git history. Oliver's explicit authorization is required before resuming migration implementation, signing or account changes, packaging, merges of migration work, or migration releases. Website documentation maintenance does not resume the migration. Issue #109 tracks the deferred work.
swift test covers the Foundation-based core. It doesn't exercise helper registration, signed Control Center behavior or live network changes. Use the scoped verification and release procedures in CONTRIBUTING.md and WORKLOG.md for changes to those surfaces.
- jamestut/awdlkiller provided inspiration for Ping Warden's approach to AWDL control.
- james-howard/AWDLControl provided a reference for the SMAppService and XPC architecture.
The source code is MIT, Copyright (c) 2025-2026 Oliver Ames, build it, inspect it, and modify it under MIT whether you buy a license or not. See LICENSE for the full terms.
The prebuilt, signed, and notarized app is free to download. The dashboard, latency history, diagnostics, and updates are free to use. Enabling Ping Protection, including starting a Latency Session, requires a purchased key or an active transition. Pricing covers what it costs, how verification works, and how the existing-user transition and donor path apply.
Maintained by Oliver Ames in Vermont • GitHub • LinkedIn • Bluesky