Record the screen, a window, or an area

Capture the full screen, one window, or an area you draw. Microphone and system audio record together on separate tracks, at your display's full resolution and 60 fps.

Three capture modes

Full screen. Record an entire display. On a multi-display setup, pick which one.
Window. Record a single app window. Other windows, notifications, and your desktop stay out of the recording.
Area. Draw a rectangle and record only what is inside it.

Start and stop a recording with a keyboard shortcut you choose, or from the menu bar. A three-second countdown runs before capture begins, and you can skip it. While you record, the menu bar shows the elapsed time and a stop button. You can pause a recording and resume it later. The result is one recording with the pause removed.

See every source live before you choose

New Recording shows each display and each open window as a live picture, each camera's view, and each microphone's level, all at once, so you can see which camera frames you best and which microphone hears you before a long take. Put on AirPods, plug in a microphone, or open the window you want, and it shows up while the picker is open. A microphone or camera you chose before is picked again when it connects.

While you record, the recording controls show a level meter for the microphone and one for system audio, each marked with its icon, so you can see which sound is being captured. If the microphone goes silent or is unplugged, the controls say so while you can still fix it.

Audio on separate tracks

System audio and your microphone record at the same time, on separate tracks. In the editor you can adjust or mute either track without changing the other. Turn down app sounds under your narration, or mute your mic track and keep the app audio.

In macOS 26, the recorder built into QuickTime and the Screenshot toolbar records the microphone but not system audio. See Screen Recording vs. QuickTime.

Clicks, keystrokes, and the cursor

Your cursor, clicks, and keystrokes are recorded apart from the picture. In the editor you can hide the cursor, enlarge it, or smooth its movement, draw a ring around each click, and show the keys you press. The editor shows them as they will export, and you can change them afterward and export again. A new recording also starts with a zoom on each run of clicks. See zoom, backgrounds, and the cursor.

Quality

Recordings capture at your display's native resolution at 60 fps, 4K on a 4K display and 5K on a Studio Display. There is no watermark.

Recording length

There is no time limit. Recording length is limited by the free space on your disk.

Camera

Add a camera bubble to any recording. You can move and resize it at any time, while recording and again in the editor. See camera and captions.

Find your recordings

Recordings are saved as documents in a folder you choose. The default is ~/Movies/Screen Recording, and double-clicking a recording in the Finder opens it in the editor. The menu bar lists your recent recordings, and a library window shows every recording, with options to open it in the editor, share it, export it, reveal it in the Finder, or delete it.

Everything stays local

Recording writes to disk on your Mac. Nothing streams to a server, so recording works offline and there is no upload step when you stop. See privacy.