Capturing Screenshots

Ways to start a capture

ScreenSnap Pro lives in the menu bar on Mac and in the system tray on Windows. Its menu has an item for each screenshot mode except Repeat Last Screenshot, and you can give any mode a keyboard shortcut. These are the modes, with the names you see in the app:

1. 1Capture Area: drag over any part of the screen. Default shortcut Cmd + Shift + 1 on Mac, Ctrl + Shift + 1 on Windows.
2. 2Capture Area (Editor): the same selection, but the screenshot opens straight in the editor. Default shortcut Cmd + Shift + 2 on Mac, Ctrl + Shift + 2 on Windows.
3. 3Capture Area with Delay: select an area, then ScreenSnap Pro waits a few seconds before taking the shot.
4. 4Capture Screen: captures the whole display your pointer is on.
5. 5Capture Window: pick one open window from a panel of window thumbnails.
6. 6Recognize Text: select an area and copy the text in it. See Text Recognition (OCR).
7. 7Capture Website: capture a web page from its address. See Website Capture.
8. 8Repeat Last Screenshot: captures the same area, window or screen as your last screenshot. It is not in the menu and works from a shortcut only.

Menu bar and tray icon

On Mac, click the ScreenSnap Pro icon in the menu bar to open the menu. On Windows, right-click the tray icon to open the full menu. A left-click on the Windows tray icon starts Capture Area (Editor) by default. You can change that in Settings > General > Tray Icon Left-Click to Capture Area, Show tray menu or Do nothing. This setting only appears on Windows.

Capture Controls

Choose Open Capture Controls… at the top of the menu to open a small capture bar with three tabs: Screenshot, Screen Recording and Web Capture. The Screenshot tab has a button for each mode: Area, Window, Display (the whole screen), Editor (the same as Capture Area (Editor)) and Capture Delay, which starts Capture Area with Delay and shows your current delay, for example Capture Delay (3s). Press Esc to close the bar. Screen Recording and Web Capture need an active license.

Capture an area

The capture overlay covers every connected display, so you can start on any screen. A single selection stays within one display.

1. 1Press Cmd + Shift + 1 on Mac or Ctrl + Shift + 1 on Windows, or choose Capture Area from the menu.
2. 2Crosshair guide lines follow your pointer. Move to one corner of what you want to capture.
3. 3Click and drag to the opposite corner. Everything outside your selection dims, and a label next to the pointer shows the size in pixels.
4. 4Release the mouse button. The screenshot is saved, copied to your clipboard and shown in Quick Preview.

Capture straight into the editor

Capture Area (Editor) works like Capture Area, but the screenshot opens in the ScreenSnap Pro editor instead of Quick Preview, ready for arrows, text, blur and backgrounds. Press Cmd + Shift + 2 on Mac or Ctrl + Shift + 2 on Windows, or click Editor in Capture Controls. This screenshot is not saved to your folder or copied until you click Copy or Save in the editor.

Capture a window

On Mac, only the selected window is captured, even if other windows overlap it, and without its drop shadow. To add a shadow or a background, open the screenshot in the editor. See Backgrounds.

1. 1Choose Capture Window from the menu, or click Window in Capture Controls.
2. 2A panel titled "Select a window to capture" shows a thumbnail and the name of each open window.
3. 3Click the window you want. Press Esc or click the close button to cancel.

Capture the whole screen

Choose Capture Screen from the menu, or click Display in Capture Controls. ScreenSnap Pro captures the entire display your pointer is on, right away, with no extra click. With several displays connected, move the pointer to the display you want first. If you assign a shortcut to Capture Screen, you can hover over the right display and press it.

Capture with a delay

A delay gives you time to open a menu, hover over a button to show its tooltip, or start an animation before the shot is taken. There are two ways to use it:

1. 1One time: choose Capture Area with Delay from the menu (it shows the delay, for example Capture Area with Delay (3s)) or click Capture Delay in Capture Controls. Select the area, then set up the screen while ScreenSnap Pro waits.
2. 2For every screenshot: open Capture Delay in the menu and choose Enable Delay, or turn on Settings > Screenshots > Capture Delay. The delay then applies to Capture Area, Capture Area (Editor), Capture Screen, Capture Window, Recognize Text and Repeat Last Screenshot until you turn it off.

Repeat your last screenshot

Repeat Last Screenshot takes a new screenshot of exactly the same target as your last one: the same area on the same display, the same window, or the same screen. It is handy for before and after shots, or for capturing a changing chart at the same size every time. It has no shortcut by default and is not in the menu, so first assign one in Settings > Shortcuts > Repeat Last Screenshot. The new shot is saved and shown in Quick Preview like Capture Area, even if the original went to the editor.

Where your screenshots go

Every screenshot from Capture Area, Capture Area with Delay, Capture Screen, Capture Window, Repeat Last Screenshot and Capture Website is saved as a file, copied to your clipboard and shown in Quick Preview. By default, files are PNGs in a ScreenSnap Pro folder on your Desktop, on Mac and on Windows. Choose Open Screenshots Folder in the menu to jump there. To change what happens after a capture:

1. 1Settings > General > Save Folder and File Name Pattern: where files are saved and how they are named.
2. 2Settings > Screenshots > Default Screenshot Format: PNG (default), JPEG, WebP or AVIF.
3. 3Settings > Screenshots > Copy to Clipboard: turn it off if you don't want each screenshot copied automatically.
4. 4Settings > Screenshots > Display Quick Preview: turn it off to skip the thumbnail after each capture. Screenshots are still saved.

Freeze the screen while selecting (Mac)

Some things vanish the moment you start a capture, such as hover menus, dropdowns or a frame of a playing video. Turn on Settings > Screenshots > Freeze Screen to freeze the display under the pointer while you select an area. It works with Capture Area, Capture Area (Editor) and Recognize Text. Captures may start slightly slower. Timed captures stay live: Capture Area with Delay never freezes, and Freeze Screen is skipped while Capture Delay is turned on for every screenshot. This setting is available on Mac only.

Troubleshooting on Mac: permissions

ScreenSnap Pro needs Screen Recording permission to capture your screen. Without it you see "Screen Recording Permission Required", and Capture Window may report that it failed to get the window list. ScreenSnap Pro also asks for Accessibility permission for its global shortcuts. More detail is in Permissions on macOS and Windows.

1. 1Open Settings > Permissions in ScreenSnap Pro. Each permission shows Granted or Not granted.
2. 2Click Allow Screen Recording. macOS opens System Settings > Privacy & Security, where the list is called Screen & System Audio Recording (Screen Recording on older macOS versions). Turn on ScreenSnap Pro.
3. 3If your shortcuts don't respond, click Allow Accessibility Access and turn on ScreenSnap Pro in the Accessibility list.
4. 4Choose Quit ScreenSnap Pro from the menu and open the app again so macOS applies the change.

Troubleshooting: a shortcut does nothing

First check that the mode has a shortcut at all: only Capture Area and Capture Area (Editor) have one out of the box. If the system or another app already uses a shortcut, ScreenSnap Pro shows "Shortcut Unavailable". Open Settings > Shortcuts and record a different combination, or use the switch next to a shortcut to turn it off. See Change or Turn Off Shortcuts.

Troubleshooting on Windows: black screenshots

HDR displays, laptops with two graphics chips, remote desktop sessions and some graphics drivers can make Windows return a completely black image. When ScreenSnap Pro detects this, it shows "Screen Capture Problem". Click Relaunch in Compatibility Mode to restart the app with a more compatible capture method.