What coaching actually happens
Peeku offers three forms of optional wellness coaching, all of which are disabled by default but easy to turn on. Each is independent; you can use one, all, or none.
Walk reminders. You set a target walk interval (the default is 60 minutes). Peeku counts your presence time at the desk and shows a countdown in the menu bar. When the countdown reaches zero, it sends you a nudge, either visual, audio, or both, depending on your settings. You can take the walk or skip it; the app respects your choice and resets the timer. This is a simple interval-based reminder, not a step counter or fitness tracker.
Look-away breaks. The American Optometric Association endorses the 20-20-20 rule: every 20 minutes spent looking at a screen, take a 20-second break to look at something at least 20 feet away. Peeku can remind you to do this. When the reminder is due, a small HUD appears in the corner of your screen with a countdown; you look away, the app senses that your face has turned or that you are no longer looking at the screen, and the break counts as taken. No timer, no forced pause; Peeku just confirms you actually rested your eyes and then resets.
Posture hints. Peeku can detect when your head position changes, when you lean in close to the screen, or when you tilt your head significantly. These are gentle nudges, not medical diagnoses. The app notices body-pose features from your face in frame and shows a small visual cue in the menu bar or as a transient hint. It is honest: this is a shape-based observation ("your face is much closer than usual"), not a measurement of your spine, vertebrae, or medical posture health. It is a hint to be aware, not a clinical assessment.
How posture detection works (and what it is not)
When Peeku first launches, it captures a series of frames of your face and records the baseline distance from your camera. This distance becomes a reference point. As Peeku continues to run, it tracks the relative size of your face in the camera frame. If your face gets significantly larger (you have leaned in close), or if your head angle shifts noticeably (you have rotated or tilted your head), Peeku can detect that change and show you a hint.
This detection is based on computer vision features extracted from your face, not on a measurement of your spine or a formal posture assessment. It answers the question, "Are you leaning in more than usual?" but it does not answer, "Is your spine at a healthy angle?" or "Are you sitting at the correct ergonomic height?" If you have questions about ergonomic posture or pain, consult a physiotherapist or occupational health specialist; Peeku is a contextual nudge, not a medical tool.
The hints work best when you are at a desk with a fixed camera angle. If your camera is on a monitor arm that you adjust throughout the day, the baseline distance will drift, and the hints become less reliable. Peeku lets you reset the baseline at any time from the settings panel, so you can re-calibrate if you change your setup.
Understanding the limits of posture detection is important. Peeku uses Apple Vision's face-detection framework, which extracts geometric features from your face: distance, head angle, eye openness, and looking-away state. These are classical computer vision features, not learned medical models. They tell you whether your head is closer or farther than before, or rotated, but they are not medical-grade data. They cannot diagnose postural strain, neck pain, or repetitive stress injuries. What they can do is remind you that you have been leaning in more than usual, which is useful as a general awareness nudge.
Why these reminders sit inside a lock app
It might seem odd to bundle wellness coaching with a screen lock. But there is a practical reason: Peeku is already running your camera and monitoring your presence all day. It is already capturing frame data, analysing distance and head angle, and maintaining a presence ledger. Adding coaching on top of that data makes the reminders contextual in ways that a standalone wellness app cannot achieve.
For example, Peeku knows when you are on a video call. During a call, your face is usually facing the camera and your attention is on the screen, exactly when a "look away from your screen" reminder would be disruptive and unhelpful. So Peeku pauses eye-break reminders during calls. It can tell a call is in progress because the microphone is in use, which Peeku reads from a macOS device-status flag rather than by listening to any audio. That same presence awareness means walk reminders can be smart too: if you have just walked away and come back, the timer does not restart; Peeku counts actual seated time, not clock time.
The same contextual awareness applies to posture hints. If you are focused on video content or a long document and have naturally leaned in, Peeku may suggest you adjust your distance or head angle, but it will space out these hints to avoid nagging. And during a call, when some amount of lean-in is normal and expected, the hints are suppressed. The app tries to be helpful without being intrusive.
This bundling also means the coaching is free and requires no extra account, subscription, or cloud service. Everything runs on your Mac. The wellness data, how many walks you took, how many eye breaks you took, your daily activity score, stays in a local ledger that never leaves your computer. You own your wellness history.
On-device, optional, and honest
All coaching is processed on your Mac using the same Apple Vision framework that powers the face detection for the lock. No frames leave your computer. Your face data is never sent to Peeku's servers or to any third party. You do not need to create an account, log in, or share any personal information; the coaching works entirely offline on your Mac. The wellness data, your walk history, eye-break counts, posture logs, stays in a local ledger that only you can access.
Coaching is off by default; you choose to turn it on, and you can turn it off at any time, even mid-session. The menu bar shows your coaching settings, so you always know what is running. If you disable a feature, it stops immediately; your local data remains but is not transmitted anywhere.
The 20-20-20 rule is endorsed by the American Optometric Association and is grounded in research on computer vision syndrome and eye strain. Peeku implements it faithfully: 20 minutes at the screen, 20 seconds away, 20 feet or more. The other reminders, walk interval, posture hints, are gentler and more personal; they adapt to your habits and your preferences.
If you find coaching distracting or unhelpful, turn it off. Peeku's core purpose is to lock your screen when you walk away, and that works with or without coaching. The wellness features are an option, not a requirement.
Getting started with coaching
When you first launch Peeku, you will see the menu bar panel with your presence signals (face, watch, input activity) and toggles for away-lock. Below that, you will see a "Coaching" section with three toggle switches: walk reminders, look-away breaks, and posture hints. Each is off by default.
To enable walk reminders, toggle the switch and set your desired interval in the settings panel (60 minutes is the default). To enable eye breaks, toggle the look-away switch; Peeku will start a 20-minute countdown the next time you have unbroken screen time. To enable posture hints, toggle posture; Peeku will show subtle visual cues in the menu bar when it detects significant lean-in or head-angle changes.
All three features work in the background without requiring your input. Walk and eye-break reminders count down silently; posture hints appear only when a significant change is detected. You remain in control: skip a walk reminder if you are in the middle of something, or acknowledge an eye break and reset the timer. The coaching never locks your screen or prevents you from working; it simply offers reminders and tracks your wellness data for your own awareness.
The free direct version of Peeku includes the coaching features alongside the full automatic lock. On the Mac App Store, Peeku Presence Coach offers the sandboxed coaching path: eye-rest nudges, walk reminders, local presence signals, and an optional Desk Health score. The full lock remains outside the App Store because Apple's sandbox blocks automatic screen-lock commands.
Free Mac App Store build
Prefer the App Store path?
Install Peeku Presence Coach for eye-rest nudges, walk reminders, optional Desk Health, and private local presence signals. The full walk-away lock still needs the direct Mac build because the App Store sandbox blocks automatic screen-lock commands.