Snappilot

The free, open-source Snagit alternative for macOS.
Capture · Annotate · Record · OCR — native, on-device, and private.

 

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📥 Download & install

1. Download Snappilot.dmg from the latest release.
2. Open the .dmg and drag Snappilot onto the Applications folder.
3. First launch: right-click Snappilot → Open (the app is signed but not yet notarized), or run xattr -cr /Applications/Snappilot.app.
4. On first capture/record, allow Screen Recording (and Microphone / Camera if used) in System Settings → Privacy & Security.

Prefer to build from source? See Build & run below.

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✨ Overview

Snappilot is a fast, modern screen-capture studio for macOS — think Snagit or CleanShot, but free, open-source, and 100% private. Grab exactly the part of the screen you want, annotate it in a Snagit-style editor, record it to a compact HEVC video (with a webcam bubble, mic and countdown), and pull selectable text out of anything with on-device OCR. Every capture auto-saves to a searchable local library — searchable even by the words inside your screenshots.

Why Snappilot?

🆓 Free & open source	No license, no subscription, MIT-licensed.
🔒 Private by design	100% on-device. No telemetry, no accounts, no cloud. OCR runs locally via Apple Vision.
⚡ Native & fast	Pure Swift + ScreenCaptureKit — lightweight, Retina-crisp, no Electron.
🎨 Genuinely powerful	Magnifier capture, a full annotation editor, screen recording, video trim/annotation, GIF export, auto-redaction, and more.

Typical workflow

1. Capture — ⌃⇧1 and drag a region (or record with ⌃⇧5).
2. Annotate — the editor opens; add arrows, callouts, step numbers, blur, stamps.
3. Share — Copy, Save, drag out, or turn a recording into a GIF.
4. Find it later — it's in your library, searchable by its OCR'd text.

🏠 Dashboard Colorful quick-capture cards (Region · Window · Full Screen · Grab Text · Record), one row of recording options (system audio · mic · camera · cursor · countdown · quality), and a searchable library of every capture — with copy, favorite & delete.

✏️ Annotation editor Snagit-style toolbar (arrow, text, callout, shapes, step, highlight, blur, pen, stamp, crop), a live Quick Styles preset grid, and Tool Properties (color, thickness, opacity, arrow start/end/size) on a clean canvas.

🚀 Features

Capture

• 🟦 Region · 🪟 Window · 🖥️ Full Screen — a crisp crosshair overlay with a live magnifier loupe, pixel dimensions, and keyboard hints.
• ⏱️ Delay timer — 3s/5s countdown before a screenshot.
• ⌨️ Global shortcuts — trigger any capture from anywhere. Fully customizable.
• 🫥 Snappilot hides itself during capture so it never lands in your shot.

Annotate (Snagit-style editor)

• ➡️ Arrows, lines, rectangles, ellipses, callouts, freehand pen
• 🔢 Step badges — auto-numbered 1·2·3, A·B·C, or a·b·c
• 🖍️ Highlighter · 🙈 Blur / redact · ✂️ Crop · ⭐ Stamps (emoji)
• 🛡️ Auto-redact — one click blurs detected emails & card numbers (on-device OCR)
• 🖼️ Polished frames — wrap a shot in a gradient background + shadow for sharing
• 🎨 Quick Styles — 10+ one-click presets per tool (solid / dashed / dotted, dot & bar arrow heads, fills, colors)
• 🎚️ Tool properties: custom color, thickness, opacity, arrow start/end/size
• ↩️ Non-destructive layers, undo/redo, move & edit anything

Record

• 🎥 Record a region or the full screen → compact HEVC MP4 (Small / Balanced / High quality)
• 🔊 System audio · 🎙️ Microphone · 📷 Webcam overlay · 🖱️ cursor — all optional
• 🎙️ Microphone noise cancellation — voice-processed mic (noise suppression + echo cancellation)
• ⏸️ Pause / Resume — the paused span is stitched out cleanly
• ⏱️ "Ready to Record" panel + 3·2·1 countdown (outside the frame) + a live frame indicator
• ✍️ Draw on screen while recording — pen, highlighter, a fading laser pointer & arrows, captured into the video. Ink auto-fades when you stop, Google-Meet style (press Esc to exit).
• 📸 Screenshot while recording — grab a still without stopping the recording
• ▶️ Recordings open in Snappilot's own player — never QuickTime — with Trim, Annotate (draw on a frame, baked over the whole clip), and GIF export

🧠 Meeting Mode (on-device AI)

• 🎙️ Record a call (Google Meet / Zoom) and get an automatic transcript — all processed on your Mac, nothing uploaded.
• 🗣️ Speakers split into You vs Participants automatically (mic vs system audio); real per-speaker names are read from Google Meet's live captions when they're on.
• ✅ Auto-generated Summary, Action Items & Key Points — saved as Markdown next to the recording, searchable, and one-click imported into the task board.

📸 Capture, extended

• 📜 Scrolling capture — auto-scroll a long page and stitch it into one tall image
• 🗂️ Collections — drag captures into named groups · 🏷️ tags · 📌 Pin to Screen
• 📄 PDF export — pick images and export a multi-page PDF

✅ Tasks — a Linear-style board

• 🗂️ Board To do / In progress / Review / Done + a List view; drag cards to change status
• 🔑 Issue-key chips · 🚩 priority · 🏷️ labels · 👤 assignee avatars · subtask progress bars
• 📝 Full task detail page: Markdown description, subtasks with their own descriptions, comments (Markdown), activity history, image/file attachments
• 🔔 Due-date reminders (local notifications) · ⬆️ export to Markdown / Apple Reminders

📓 Notes — a Markdown workspace

• ✍️ Live split editor — raw Markdown ↔ rendered preview, updating as you type
• 🖼️ Images in Markdown (insert, drag-and-drop, ![alt](url) renders inline)
• ⭐ favorite · 📌 pin · 🗄️ archive · duplicate · export; search; word count & reading time
• 🧭 Notes list lives in the collapsible main sidebar for a distraction-free editor

OCR & Library

• 🔤 Grab Text — extract selectable text from any region via Apple Vision
• 🗂️ Every capture auto-saves to a local library, searchable by the text inside it
• ⭐ Favorites · 📋 copy · 🗑️ delete · 🔎 instant search · 💾 live storage usage in the sidebar

Design

• 🌗 Full light & dark theme support (follows your system)
• 🧭 Clean collapsible sidebar dashboard · menu-bar quick access · full app menu with shortcuts

⌨️ Default shortcuts

Shortcut	Action		Shortcut	Action
⌃⇧1	Region		⌃⇧6	Record Screen
⌃⇧2	Window		⌃⇧7	Scrolling Capture
⌃⇧3	Full Screen		⌃⇧8	Record Meeting
⌃⇧4	Grab Text (OCR)		⌃⇧.	Stop Recording
⌃⇧5	Record Region			(all customizable in Settings)

🛠️ Build & run

Requires macOS 14+, Xcode 16+, and XcodeGen (brew install xcodegen).

xcodegen generate        # creates Snappilot.xcodeproj
open Snappilot.xcodeproj  # then Run (⌘R)

swift run snapverify      # framework-free logic tests for SnapCore

On first capture/record, macOS asks for Screen Recording (and, if used, Microphone / Camera) permission — enable Snappilot in System Settings → Privacy & Security.

🏗️ Architecture

• SnapCore — a UI-free, unit-tested Swift package: capture/crop geometry, the Vision OCR wrapper, image ops, sensitive-data detection, the annotation layer model, and the local-library index.
• App — SwiftUI + AppKit: capture overlay, ScreenCaptureKit controller, the annotation editor, recorder, video player, menu-bar UI, hotkeys, and settings.

Logic lives in SnapCore so it can be tested without a UI; everything visual consumes it through clean value types.

🗺️ Roadmap

Shipped: ✅ Meeting Mode · ✅ Scrolling capture · ✅ Collections & tags · ✅ PDF export · ✅ Pause/Resume · ✅ Noise cancellation · ✅ Task board · ✅ Notes workspace

Next:

• Timeline view + Filter / Sort / Group on the task board
• Per-subtask due dates & assignees · linked issues
• Note folders & backlinks · slash-commands in the editor
• Templates / step-guides · quick share

🤝 Contributing

Contributions are welcome! Please read CONTRIBUTING.md first.

• 🐛 Report a bug
• 💡 Request a feature
• 🔀 main is protected — changes land via pull request with review.

🛡️ Security

Found a vulnerability? Please report it privately — see SECURITY.md. Do not open a public issue for security problems.

🔒 Privacy

100% on-device. No telemetry, no third-party services, no account. OCR runs locally via Apple Vision; recordings and captures never leave your Mac.

📄 License

MIT.