How to uninstall FlowDown on Mac

FlowDown is an AI chat app for the Mac and iPhone, from flowdown.ai and its GitHub project. It is sandboxed, so your conversations, settings and any downloaded local models sit in one container folder. In the test that container held a conversation database, a Models.Local folder and the app's logs. Per the project's README, content stays on your device or in your private iCloud, and model configurations can be exported as .fdmodel files. Decide what to keep before you remove anything: export the model configurations you want, and copy the container's Documents folder if you want a raw copy of your chats. This guide covers the GitHub release and the Homebrew cask flowdown.

Quit and remove the app

  1. Export the model configurations you want to keep as .fdmodel files, and copy ~/Library/Containers/wiki.qaq.flow/Data/Documents somewhere safe if you want your chat history.
  2. Quit FlowDown with Command + Q. In the test it ran as 3 processes (the app plus two macOS helper services) and registered no login item or launch agent.
  3. Open Finder, go to Applications and drag FlowDown.app to the Trash.
  4. Remove the container yourself if Mole could not (see below). Quit FlowDown first; macOS may refuse to trash a sandbox container unless the app doing the removal has Full Disk Access. Grant it in System Settings › Privacy & Security › Full Disk Access, or move the folder to the Trash yourself in Finder once FlowDown has quit.

Where the data lives

Press Shift + Command + G in Finder to open each path. Skip any path that is not on your Mac.

Location What it holds What to do
~/Library/Containers/wiki.qaq.flow Conversation database Documents/Objects.db, local models in Documents/Models.Local, logs, preferences, saved window state Copy what you want first, then remove. Selected by default; with Full Disk Access Mole can move it, without it Mole's report asks for that permission.
~/Library/Application Scripts/wiki.qaq.flow An empty scripts folder Remove. Selected by default.
~/Library/Group Containers/group.wiki.qaq/FlowDown FlowDown's Models/Cloud folder in an app group named group.wiki.qaq Remove only the FlowDown folder if you no longer want it. Mole does not offer it, because group.wiki.qaq is a group shared across the developer's apps; leave the parent.
The folder that getconf DARWIN_USER_CACHE_DIR prints, then wiki.qaq.flow Mole's temporary cache row, about 10 MB in the test Remove. Selected by default.

Check the result

pgrep -il flowdown
ls -d /Applications/FlowDown.app ~/Library/Containers/wiki.qaq.flow ~/Library/Application\ Scripts/wiki.qaq.flow ~/Library/Group\ Containers/group.wiki.qaq/FlowDown
  • No output from pgrep means FlowDown is not running. A printed line is a process still alive; quit it and run the command again.
  • For ls -d, "No such file or directory" means that path is gone. A printed Containers path means the container is still on disk, which is what the test ended with. A printed Group Containers path is the folder Mole does not offer.

If you installed it with Homebrew

brew uninstall --cask flowdown

The cask only quits the app on an ordinary uninstall, so this removes the app and nothing else. brew uninstall --cask --zap flowdown also trashes ~/Library/Containers/wiki.qaq.flow, ~/Library/Containers/wiki.qaq.flow.FlowDownWidget, ~/Library/Containers/wiki.qaq.FlowDown.Community, ~/Library/Application Scripts/wiki.qaq.flow and the app's recent-documents entry, which deletes your conversations and local models with them. A direct brew command does not read Mole's checkboxes. Mole adds --zap only when its whole removal scope passes its zap gate (unchecked or shared paths, paths outside the reviewed boundary, unknown stanzas and unsupported directives suppress it), and otherwise removes the rows you selected itself. The Homebrew install was not tested.

What Mole lists

Mole selects the app, ~/Library/Application Scripts/wiki.qaq.flow, ~/Library/Containers/wiki.qaq.flow and its temporary cache row. It does not list ~/Library/Group Containers/group.wiki.qaq/FlowDown. Before removing, Mole asks FlowDown to quit.

What this test covered

On November 9, 2026, the test downloaded FlowDown 5.2.4 as a universal zip archive from the project's GitHub release, whose checksum matched the Homebrew cask, copied the app to Applications without running brew install, launched it once and quit it. A source-built Mole with the review rows ticked moved the app, the scripts folder and the temporary cache row to the Trash. The container stayed because the test build ran without Full Disk Access (macOS refused with error 513). Also left were FlowDown under group.wiki.qaq, which Mole does not offer, and macOS's own records of the app (a recent-documents file and a shortcut database), which Mole's scan could not read or does not manage. Status showed one FlowDown row with 3 processes. Mole found no update channel, and no update was run. No model was added, no chat started, iCloud sync was not turned on, and the Homebrew install and Mole's notarized release build were not tested.