What to check before an AI reads your iMessages

Five questions decide this, and the first one matters most: can the tool send a message as you? If you want your assistant to text people for you, that points at Macuse or LMCP. If you want it only to read, that points at iMCP or Pomeroy, and the second question, whether it needs Full Disk Access, is where those two differ from the rest.

I should say plainly that I built Pomeroy, so this is an interested party's checklist. Every fact about another tool was checked against its own site on 3 September 2026, each one has a comparison page here with its sources listed, and where another tool is the better answer this post says so.

How I put this list together

These five questions come from the rows this site already compares every Mac tool on, narrowed to Messages, the app that holds your iMessage and text conversations. Each is answered with the five tools this site holds checked facts about, iMCP, Macuse, LMCP, apple-mcp and Pomeroy, and nothing else; all five can read Messages. The order puts first what cannot be undone, a sent message, then how much of your Mac the tool can see, then what leaves it, then how you take access back and whether the tool will still work next year.

The five things to check before you connect Messages

• Can it send as you? Start here, because a text cannot be unsent. Macuse sends mail and messages. LMCP sends and replies in Mail, Outlook, Messages, Teams, Slack and WhatsApp. apple-mcp is read and write, including sending iMessages and email. iMCP reads Messages and cannot send a message, and Pomeroy cannot send a message or a reply either. Pick a tool that cannot send if you want every text in your name to be one you typed. Not for you if you want your assistant to reply for you, where Macuse or LMCP is the honest answer.
• Does it need Full Disk Access? Your messages sit in one file that macOS guards behind Full Disk Access, and that one switch hands over every file on the Mac, including your mail, your browser history and your backups. Pomeroy never asks for it: a normal file dialog opens once and you hand it the one file Messages keeps your conversations in. apple-mcp grants its permissions to whichever program started it, often the Terminal. The comparison pages here do not record which grant iMCP, Macuse or LMCP needs for Messages, so ask each one before you install it. Pick a tool that reads one file if you want the rest of your Mac left out of it. Not for you if you already grant Full Disk Access to your Terminal and are comfortable with that.
• What leaves your Mac, and how would you know? Whatever your assistant reads becomes part of your conversation with it, whichever tool you use, so the difference is what else goes out. LMCP sends a heartbeat about every five minutes carrying its version, your macOS version, CPU type and a hashed machine identifier, and its optional cloud relay routes requests through LMCP's servers. Macuse states that everything stays on your Mac, with no cloud and no telemetry of your content, and is closed source, so that is a claim rather than something you can check; its Remote Access for ChatGPT and claude.ai on the web runs over your own Tailscale network. iMCP is open source, so what it does with your data is there to read. Pomeroy makes a licence check, an update check and four pseudonymous usage counts, all listed on the privacy policy. Pick the one you can check in the way you prefer, by reading code or reading a list. None is for you if you want no network requests at all.
• Can you switch it off for Messages alone? You should be able to take Messages back without losing your calendar. In Pomeroy, Messages is its own switch and starts off; switch it off and the one-file bookmark is all Pomeroy loses. Macuse approves each app and each client separately, and those approvals can be revoked. Pick a tool with a per-app switch if you want to try Messages for a week and change your mind. Not for you if you would rather manage every grant in System Settings yourself.
• Is anyone still looking after it? apple-mcp was archived on 1 January 2026 and gets no fixes and no support for new macOS versions. iMCP's last release was 1.4.1 on 7 May 2025, and work started again in September 2026 after a quiet year. Macuse, LMCP and Pomeroy are actively developed. Pick something maintained if you want Messages to keep working after the next macOS release. apple-mcp is not for you unless you are happy to fix it yourself.

What should I look for in a tool this list does not cover?

Ask it the same five questions and make it answer them on its own site. Two do most of the work: whether it can send in your name, and whether it wants Full Disk Access to read one file.

A good answer names actions and grants rather than adjectives. "Reads your messages, cannot send, never asks for Full Disk Access" tells you what you need; "full iMessage integration" does not. If a tool will not say whether it can send, treat that as a yes.

Is Pomeroy the same as Anthropic's iMessage plugin?

No. Anthropic's iMessage plugin is for Claude Code: it reads the Messages database directly, needs Full Disk Access for your Terminal, and sends replies through Messages so you can text your assistant from your phone.

Pomeroy is a separate app, made by me and not by Anthropic. It reads only the one file you pick, never asks for Full Disk Access, and cannot send anything. If texting your assistant from your phone is what you want, the plugin does that and Pomeroy does not.

Can my AI assistant reply to a message?

With Macuse, LMCP or apple-mcp, yes. With Pomeroy, no: it cannot send messages, so your assistant cannot either. It can draft a reply for you to copy into Messages and send yourself.

Is it safe to give an AI assistant access to iMessage?

It is as safe as pasting the same messages into your assistant yourself, because that is close to what happens. So ask about the messages you would be happy to paste. There is a longer answer in is it safe to let Claude read your iMessages.

What Pomeroy cannot do

Pomeroy cannot send a message or a reply, and it cannot delete anything in Messages. It cannot send mail either, and there is no action anywhere in it that deletes anything in any app.

It cannot read your screen or click around an app for you: it never asks for Accessibility or Screen Recording, which you can check in System Settings. It reaches only assistants running on the same Mac, so ChatGPT and claude.ai on the web are out, and it needs macOS 15 or later. A Shortcut you built yourself can send a message, and Pomeroy can run a Shortcut you name. That power is yours, set up in the Shortcuts app, and Pomeroy cannot create or change one.

How do I set it up?

Setup is four steps: download Pomeroy, switch Messages on and hand it the conversations file when it asks, set up your assistant when Pomeroy offers it, then ask a question. There is no account and no card. Once Messages is on, asks like these work:

• "Find the message with the door code."
• "What did Sam say about the weekend?"
• "Who has messaged me this week?"
• "Find the address Alex texted me last month."

Download Pomeroy to try it. It is free for 50 actions a week, $19 once after that with no subscription, and there is a 14-day refund; the pricing page has the detail. The Messages page lists what an assistant can and cannot do there.

Which should you pick?

If you want your assistant to send texts as well as read them, Macuse is the one to look at, and it runs on macOS 13 or later. If you want that for free, or your conversations run through WhatsApp, Teams and Slack as well as Messages, LMCP covers more ground than anything else here. If you want free and open source, and read-only suits you, iMCP. If you want to text Claude Code from your phone, Anthropic's own plugin is built for exactly that.

If what you want is an assistant that reads your messages, answers from what it finds, never asks for Full Disk Access and can never send in your name, that is what I built Pomeroy for. Download it, or read the comparisons first and check my working.