MacGet uses adaptive connections to outsmart CDN throttling during downloads

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MacGet, a free open-source macOS download manager, was built after its developer discovered that opening more parallel download connections often slows transfers down rather than speeding them up. Modern CDNs treat multiple simultaneous connections from a single IP as abusive behavior, responding with resets, throttling, or outright blocks. To counter this, MacGet's engine starts with four connections and dynamically scales up or down based on real throughput gains, learning and storing each host's optimal connection limit for future use. Workers are also staggered 100ms apart to avoid triggering anti-abuse systems, and a dynamic chunk-stealing mechanism prevents slow network paths from bottlenecking the entire download. Additional features include HTTP/3 support, SHA-256 integrity verification, and a workaround for macOS App Nap, which can throttle background processes.

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