Give Things its own notification sound on your Mac

Why a Things reminder is easy to miss on a Mac

Things is a beautiful, native Mac app — but macOS still plays one alert sound for every notification and only lets you switch an app's sound on or off. So a reminder you set on a to-do sounds exactly like a chat message or an email: the same chime you've half-learned to ignore.

A reminder you don't consciously notice isn't much of a reminder. When your carefully-planned Today list nudges you with the same sound as everything else, the very tasks you set it up to protect are the ones that slip.

What you can do without TrillMark

• Things' reminders. You can add a reminder time to any to-do, and Things will notify you at that moment — precise control over when you're nudged. But the notification still uses your Mac's one sound.
• Deadlines and the Today list. Deadlines and Today keep your plan honest inside the app, and they're the heart of how Things works — but they change how a task looks, not how its reminder sounds.
• System Settings › Notifications › Things. Toggle the sound on or off and choose banner vs. alert style — but no custom sound, and no way to make a real deadline louder than a routine reminder.
• A Focus. A Focus can hold Things' reminders until you're free, but that hides the nudge rather than making it recognizable.

How TrillMark makes a Things nudge land

TrillMark reacts to the banner Things shows. Add Things, give it a sound that means “time to do this” and a color, and a reminder arrives as a sound you recognize plus a labeled flash — distinct from every chat and email, so it actually registers.

Because TrillMark can read the notification's text, you can go further: a louder, more insistent sound when a reminder mentions a specific project or a word like “deadline,” and a gentle edge band for everyday nudges — so the thing you can't let slip stands apart from the rest.

It reads that text only on your Mac, only to decide how to react, and never sends it anywhere.

Set it up in about a minute

1. Open TrillMark and add Things from the popular-apps list or a recent alert.
2. Give it a sound you'll recognize as “a to-do is due” and a color; TrillMark labels the flash with the app's name.
3. Pick a flash style — a quiet edge band is enough for a nudge, or a stronger wash for something you truly can't miss.
4. Optional: add a rule with a louder sound when the reminder mentions a key project or a deadline.
5. Turn off the system sound for Things in Notification settings so you hear only the sound you chose.