Projects on your Mac

Choose New project… or Open folder…, or drop files onto the app. A folder you open stays where it is; new projects go in ~/Documents/Benchy Desktop/Projects/. Files you drag into a project are copied into its folder.

While you're signed in, each Desktop project is linked to a private project in your home workspace, so its name and chats are there too. Only the project's name and its link leave your Mac. Choose Open in Benchy in the project menu to see it in Studio, and share it or move it to another workspace from there when you want a team to see it.

Made by Benchy

What Benchy makes, such as sliced print files and renders, goes in a Made by Benchy folder. Existing files are never overwritten. The first time a folder you opened has something to keep, the chat asks “Keep what Benchy makes in a Made by Benchy folder here?”, with Keep them here or Keep them in Benchy's folder. If the folder syncs, for example with iCloud, it says that results will upload too. Change the answer later from the project menu.

What leaves your Mac

Nothing uploads on its own. To put a file from Made by Benchy into the project on Benchy, choose Add to project on Benchy. The file then shows On Benchy, and Versions on Benchy… once it has more than one version. No agent can upload for you.

Stays on your Mac	Goes to Benchy when you choose
Your project folder and its files	A file from Made by Benchy, one at a time
Sliced print files, plates, slice runs and variants	A print batch, for the team to see and print

Chat with Benchy, Claude or Codex

Choose	Paid by
Benchy	Your Benchy plan and credits
Claude, through Claude Code	Your Claude plan
Codex	Your ChatGPT plan

All three work through Benchy's tools in the project. Slicing and other work on your Mac run one heavy job at a time, and you can stop any of them.

Approvals

Before an agent does something that needs your say, a card asks. Choose Allow once or Deny, or allow that kind of action for the rest of the chat, such as Allow slicing for this chat. A card nobody answers is denied after 10 minutes. Settings shows each tool as allowed, asking once per chat, or asking every time.

Benchy in your other agents

While you're signed in, Desktop adds Benchy's hosted MCP server to Claude Code, Codex and Cursor on your Mac, so they can use your Benchy projects and tools. The first time, a notice says which agents it added Benchy to, with Undo to take it out of all of them and Done to keep it. Each agent then asks you to sign in to Benchy once:

Claude Code: type /mcp, choose benchy, and sign in.
Codex: choose Sign in in the notice.
Cursor: in Cursor's settings, under MCP, sign in beside benchy.

Turn it off for any agent in Settings → Connected agents. Desktop backs up each settings file before its first change, removes its entry when you sign out, and never touches a Benchy entry it didn't add. See Connect your agent for what connected agents can do.

Blender and other apps

Plugins let Benchy use apps on your Mac. Manage them in Settings → Plugins → Installed. See Plugins.

The Blender plugin renders previews and turntables, imports meshes, runs modelling steps such as decimate, remesh and solidify, and exports the result. Blender runs in the background, in a sandbox. The first time a chat uses it, a card asks Allow Blender for this chat. If Blender isn't on your Mac, choose Get Blender to download the official build, which Desktop checks before keeping it, or Choose… to point at your own copy.

Printers

Desktop shows your printers through Benchy Host: their state, time left, the camera and past prints. See Printers and Benchy Host.

Websites

Desktop can also build and preview websites. See Websites.

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