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The Apps page is a curated application installer that uses Winget (Windows Package Manager) or Chocolatey to install and remove software. You browse apps by category, select what you want, and click Install Selected or Uninstall Selected to run the operation. Progress is shown in the title bar.

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Package manager support

Sparkle supports two package managers:
  • Winget — The default Windows Package Manager. Available on Windows 10 and later.
  • Chocolatey — A community-driven package manager with a large library of apps.
Use the Select Source dropdown to switch between them. If the selected package manager is not installed, Sparkle detects this and offers to install it for you.
When you switch sources, your current app selection is cleared so that only apps available in the new source are shown.

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App categories

Apps are organized into nine categories:
CategoryExamples
BrowsersFirefox, Chrome, Brave, Opera, Vivaldi, Tor Browser, Zen Browser
CommunicationDiscord, Slack, Teams, Telegram, Zoom, Signal, Vesktop
DevelopmentVS Code, Visual Studio, Git, GitHub Desktop, Node.js, Docker, Python, Rust, Go
GamesSteam, Epic Games, EA App, Battle.net, Minecraft Launcher, Playnite, Modrinth
MultimediaSpotify, VLC, OBS Studio, Audacity, Krita, ShareX, FxSound
ProductivityNotion, Dropbox, Microsoft Office, Blender
Privacy & SecuritySurfshark, NordVPN, Proton VPN, Mullvad, Bitwarden, Malwarebytes
Utilities7-Zip, PowerToys, Rufus, MSI Afterburner, Everything Search
PythonPython 3.8 through 3.13
Use the search bar at the top to filter apps by name across all categories.

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Selecting and installing apps

1

Select apps

Click an app card or its checkbox to select it. You can select multiple apps across different categories. Click Uncheck All to clear your selection.
2

Install or uninstall

Click Install Selected to install all selected apps, or Uninstall Selected to remove them. Sparkle passes the app IDs to Winget or Chocolatey and runs the operation in the background. Progress is tracked in the title bar.
Some apps display a warning icon if they have known installation issues when running as administrator. Read the warning before proceeding.

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Exporting and importing an app list

You can save your current selection and restore it later or share it with others.
  • Export List — Downloads a sparkle-apps.json file containing the package IDs of all currently selected apps.
  • Import List — Opens a file picker to load a previously exported JSON file. After importing, a modal shows the apps in the file with checkboxes so you can deselect any you don’t want before installing.
The exported file is a plain JSON array of package ID strings: 
[
  "Mozilla.Firefox",
  "VideoLAN.VLC",
  "Microsoft.VisualStudioCode"
]

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App card information

Each app card shows:
  • App icon
  • App name
  • Short description
  • Package ID
  • External link button to open the app’s website (when a URL is provided)

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Adding apps via apps.json

The app list is loaded from src/renderer/assets/apps.json. To contribute a new app, add an entry with the following structure: 
{
  "name": "App Name",
  "id": "Publisher.AppName",
  "chocolatey": "package-name",
  "category": "category-name",
  "info": "Short description of the app.",
  "link": "https://example.com",
  "icon": "https://example.com/icon.png"
}

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Field reference

FieldRequiredDescription
nameYesDisplay name shown on the app card.
idYes*Winget package ID (e.g., Mozilla.Firefox).
chocolateyNoChocolatey package name. Required if the app should appear when Chocolatey is selected as the source.
categoryYesCategory for grouping. Must match an existing category name (e.g., browsers, development).
infoYesShort description shown on the app card.
linkNoWebsite URL. Shown as an external link button on the card.
iconYesURL to the app’s icon image. Displayed on the card.
warningNoOptional warning message shown to users before installation.
*Required for the Winget source. An app can have only a chocolatey field if it is not available via Winget. After editing apps.json, submit a pull request on GitHub.

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