MacPaw, the company behind Setapp and CleanMyMac, is making a bet that the future of AI on Macs is not in the cloud, but on the device itself. The company announced a partnership with Liquid AI to bring on-device inference capabilities to developers building for its ecosystem. This is a strategic move that could reshape how AI-powered apps are distributed and used.

Liquid AI is known for its efficient, small-scale neural networks that can run directly on consumer hardware. By integrating Liquid AI's inference engine into MacPaw's developer tools, apps built for Setapp or the Mac App Store can leverage local AI without sending data to external servers. That changes the calculus for developers and users.

There are clear benefits: privacy is the big one. Data stays on the machine, eliminating the risk of cloud leaks. Then there's latency—local inference is snappy, and works even offline. And for developers, hosting AI models is expensive; on-device inference cuts those operational costs dramatically.

But there's a bigger play here. Apple has been pushing its own on-device AI frameworks like Core ML, but MacPaw is offering an alternative path. By partnering with Liquid AI, they're essentially saying developers don't have to wait for Apple's vision. They can build AI features now, and deliver them through MacPaw's distribution channels.

Of course, there are limits. On-device models are generally less powerful than the largest cloud models. But for many use cases—auto-complete, image editing, local search, personal assistants—they're more than enough. And with MacPaw handling the infrastructure, developers can focus on the experience.

Why it matters: MacPaw is positioning itself as the gateway for on-device AI on Macs. This partnership could accelerate the shift toward privacy-preserving, offline-capable apps, and give MacPaw (and Liquid AI) a meaningful foothold in the Apple ecosystem before Apple fully solidifies its own approach.

The real question is whether developers will bite. But with Apple's own AI ambitions still ambiguous, MacPaw is offering a plug-and-play solution that's hard to ignore. This is one to watch.