On Windows, these tools are ‘app launchers’. They launch an instance of an app whether or not you have one already open.

On Mac, they’re ’app switchers’. They’ll launch an app, or switch to its running instance if there is one.

I dare say that this reflects the way that the Mac and Windows handle apps and processes. Either way, it makes this sort of thing singularly useless on Windows.

It might be useful to launch Outlook once, in the morning. But after that, launching more instances of Outlook is absurd. I want to switch to Outlook.

I don’t think Windows users really understand how useful these tools are as switchers; just how much faster it is to Cmd-Space, s[afari], return, and have your browser pop to the front. I should time it. If that took me more than about 100ms I’d be stunned, because I’ve done it dozens of times a day for well over a decade.

Edit: timed it. 375ms from the first sound of me pressing the space bar until Safari is on-screen. 200ms of my action, and another 175ms waiting for Safari to appear.