How to record your screen on a Mac
Three ways to do it, and the answer to the one that trips everyone up: getting sound into the recording.
The short answer. Press ⇧⌘5 for the recorder built into macOS. It records your screen and your microphone — but not the sound your Mac is playing. If you need that, you need a recorder that captures system audio.
Option 1 — the built-in recorder (⇧⌘5)
Press Shift-Command-5. A toolbar appears: choose the whole screen or a selection, then Record. Stop from the menu bar, and the file saves to your Desktop.
Good for a quick, silent clip. It can't record system audio, has no webcam overlay, and leaves you with a file you still need to upload somewhere before anyone can watch it.
Option 2 — QuickTime Player
Open QuickTime, then File ▸ New Screen Recording. Effectively the same tool as ⇧⌘5 with the same limitation: microphone yes, system audio no. Getting system audio into QuickTime means installing a virtual audio driver such as BlackHole and routing your Mac's output through it — which also means you stop hearing it through your speakers unless you build a multi-output device.
Option 3 — Clipnote
Records system audio without any of that, adds a webcam bubble, and finishes with a link instead of a file. Free, no time limit, no watermark.
- 1Open the recorder. Open Clipnote from your menu bar, or go to clipnotehq.com/record in any browser. Nothing to install if you use the browser.
- 2Choose what to record. Pick your whole screen or a single window. Choosing one window keeps everything else — your other tabs, your notifications — out of the recording.
- 3Turn on the audio you need. Switch on your microphone to narrate, and system audio to capture sound coming from your Mac. You can use either, both, or neither.
- 4Record. Press record, or hit Option-Command-R from anywhere. A floating bar shows the elapsed time and lets you pause or stop without hunting for the app.
- 5Stop and share. Press stop. The recording uploads on its own and the share link lands on your clipboard — paste it into Slack, an email, or a ticket.
Why your recording came out silent
macOS treats the sound your computer is playing as protected — an app can't just tap it. So a recorder that only asks for a microphone gets your voice and nothing else, and a screen recording of a video comes back silent.
There are two fixes. Install a virtual audio driver and reroute your output through it, which works but changes how sound behaves on your whole machine. Or use a recorder built on ScreenCaptureKit, Apple's own capture framework, which is allowed to record system audio directly. That's what Clipnote does, and why the toggle simply works.
Common questions
How do I record my screen on a Mac with sound?+
Turn on system audio in Clipnote before you record. macOS blocks apps from capturing speaker output by default, which is why QuickTime records silence — Clipnote uses Apple's ScreenCaptureKit, which captures it directly, so you don't need a virtual audio driver like BlackHole.
What is the shortcut to record the screen on a Mac?+
Shift-Command-5 opens macOS's built-in screen recording tools. In Clipnote, Option-Command-R starts and stops a recording from any app, without switching windows first.
Can I record my screen on a Mac for free?+
Yes. macOS includes a basic recorder, and Clipnote is free for 25 recordings with no time limit and no watermark.
Why is my Mac screen recording silent?+
Almost always because system audio wasn't captured. QuickTime and the built-in Shift-Command-5 recorder can only record a microphone, not the sound your Mac is playing. You need a recorder that captures system audio, or a virtual audio driver.
Where do Mac screen recordings get saved?+
The built-in recorder saves to your Desktop by default. Clipnote keeps a copy in your Movies folder — in the open, not hidden in a container — and uploads a shareable copy as well.
Try it on your next one.
Free, unlimited length, and the link is on your clipboard before you switch windows.
Start recording, free