openscreen: Open Source Photo & Video Editors

What is openscreen?

OpenScreen is a free, MIT-licensed, GPU-accelerated desktop screen recorder and video editor for Windows, macOS, and Linux that turns a raw capture into a polished product demo, aimed at developers, product teams, and technical marketers who need demo video without subscriptions or watermarks.

What it is

OpenScreen is a cross-platform desktop application built with Electron and TypeScript alongside Rust components. It records one window or the whole screen, captures microphone and system audio, adds a webcam picture-in-picture overlay, applies automatic cursor-following zooms, and exports GPU-encoded MP4 or GIF, using Metal on macOS, D3D11 on Windows, and Vulkan on Linux with automatic CPU fallback.

The project continues the original OpenScreen repository created by Siddharth Vaddem, archived after v1.5.0, with development moved to the current repository under the same name and the same MIT license with his approval. It occupies the category Screen Studio defined — polished, zoom-and-cursor-driven product demo video — as the open-source entry in it rather than a clone, and it removes that category's paywall and watermark constraints by keeping the full record-to-export pipeline free for personal and commercial use.

Key capabilities

Capture: record a specific window or the whole screen, with microphone and system audio, plus a webcam overlay supporting picture-in-picture, drag-to-position, mirroring, and shape options.
Zooms: automatic zooms that follow the cursor, manual zooms with adjustable depth, duration, easing and pixel-precise position, and cursor size, smoothing, click effects, themes and post-recording path smoothing.
Timeline editing: crop, trim, per-segment speed, snapping guides, an audio waveform, customizable keyboard shortcuts, backgrounds from wallpapers, solid colors, gradients or an uploaded image, motion blur, and text, arrow and image annotations with animation presets.
Captions: voiceover transcription runs on-device with no upload and works offline, giving an editable transcript and optional subtitle translation; supported languages include Arabic, Czech, English, Spanish, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Portuguese (Brazil), Russian, Turkish, Vietnamese, and Simplified and Traditional Chinese.
AI editing assistant: describe an edit in chat and it applies cuts, zooms, speed ramps, annotations and camera framing to the timeline, with bring-your-own-key support for Claude, OpenAI, Gemini, Mistral, OpenRouter, MiniMax or any OpenAI-compatible endpoint; nothing is enabled by default.
Export: MP4 or GIF in multiple aspect ratios and resolutions, GPU-rendered and encoded, with automatic CPU fallback.
Headless CLI: openscreen record --duration 20 --project demo.openscreen --json and openscreen export demo.openscreen -o demo.mp4 --json run with no visible windows, edit .openscreen JSON programmatically, and emit NDJSON output.

Who uses it and how

Developers and product teams publishing demo video to X, Reddit, YouTube, a docs page, or a landing page, where a raw capture must come out ready to post.
Scripts, CI pipelines, and AI coding agents that drive the headless CLI with no visible window.
Linux and Wayland users capturing natively through xdg-desktop-portal and PipeWire, with a reduced-capability browser-capture fallback when those are unavailable.
Commercial teams, since the MIT license covers personal and commercial use.

Getting started

On Windows, install from the Microsoft Store; on macOS and Linux, use the installer or the .dmg from the GitHub Releases page, dragging OpenScreen into the Applications folder on macOS.

How it compares

OpenScreen sits in the category Screen Studio defined, and is explicitly the open-source entry in it rather than a clone. It is MIT-licensed, free for personal and commercial use, and carries no watermark or paywall, so the working copy runs entirely on the user's own machine. Screen Studio remains the category's reference point; OpenScreen is the MIT-licensed route to the same kind of output.

When to use it — and when not to

It is under active development, so expect rough edges and occasional breaking changes to the .openscreen project format and the CLI; teams that need a frozen format today should look elsewhere. Platform floors are real: Windows 1903 (build 18362) with Intel 8th Gen or AMD Ryzen 2000 or newer, macOS 13 Ventura or later, and 8 GB RAM minimum with 16 GB recommended, while Linux needs xdg-desktop-portal and PipeWire for full capture and system audio. The AI assistant is off by default and needs a supplied API key, and no hosted or managed deployment is described, so one desktop machine is the whole installation.

project readme (upstream, from github) — read inline

OpenScreen

A free, open-source desktop app for recording your screen and turning the result into polished product demos and walkthroughs.

[!NOTE] This is OpenScreen, continued. Siddharth Vaddem created the project and archived the original repository after v1.5.0. Development moved here with his approval, under the same name and the same MIT license.

A raw capture goes in and comes out ready to post — on X, Reddit, YouTube, a docs page, or a landing page. That is the category Screen Studio defined; OpenScreen is the open-source entry in it, and not a clone.

100% free for personal and commercial use, with nothing held behind a paywall.

Project status. OpenScreen is under active development — expect rough edges and occasional breaking changes, including to the .openscreen project format and the CLI. Bug reports are welcome: open an issue.

Core Features

Record a specific window, or your whole screen.
Record microphone and system audio.
Webcam overlay with picture-in-picture, drag-to-position, mirroring, and shape options.
Auto or manual zooms with adjustable depth, duration, easing, and pixel-precise position; auto-zoom follows your cursor as you work.
Custom cursor size, smoothing, and click effects, with cursor themes and post-recording path smoothing.
Automatic captions for voiceovers, transcribed on-device with no upload (works offline), with an editable transcript you can cut from and optional subtitle translation.
AI editing assistant: describe the edit you want in chat and it applies to the timeline — cuts, zooms, speed ramps, annotations, camera framing. Bring your own key (Claude, OpenAI, Gemini, Mistral, OpenRouter, MiniMax, or any OpenAI-compatible endpoint); nothing is enabled by default.
Wallpapers, solid colors, gradients, or your own background image.
Motion blur.
Crop, trim, and per-segment speed control on the timeline.
Text, arrow, and image annotations, with text animation presets.
Timeline snapping guides and an audio waveform to make trimming easier.
Customizable keyboard shortcuts.
Export to MP4 or GIF in multiple aspect ratios and resolutions, rendered and encoded on the GPU (Metal on macOS, D3D11 on Windows, Vulkan on Linux) with an automatic CPU fallback.
Languages supported: Arabic, Czech, English, Spanish, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Portuguese (Brazil), Russian, Turkish, Vietnamese, Simplified Chinese, and Traditional Chinese.

Command-line interface (headless)

OpenScreen ships a CLI for scripts, CI, and AI coding agents: record the screen headlessly, edit the .openscreen project JSON programmatically (zooms, annotations, trims), and render MP4/GIF with the full export pipeline — no visible windows, NDJSON output with --json.

openscreen record --duration 20 --project demo.openscreen --json
openscreen export demo.openscreen -o demo.mp4 --json

See the CLI reference.

Installation

Every platform has a recommended route below. On Windows that is the Microsoft Store; everywhere else it is the installer from the GitHub Releases page.

System requirements

Windows: version 1903+ (build 18362) with Intel 8th Gen / AMD Ryzen 2000 series or newer minimum; Windows 11 with Intel 12th Gen / Ryzen 4000 series or newer recommended
macOS: 13 (Ventura) or later — required by ScreenCaptureKit for capture
Linux: xdg-desktop-portal and PipeWire for native capture and system audio; recording still works without them through the browser-capture fallback, with fewer capabilities (see Platform differences)
RAM: 8 GB minimum, 16 GB recommended

Full table and notes on older integrated graphics: system requirements.

macOS

Download the .dmg installer directly from the Releases page and drag OpenScreen into your Applications folder. Builds from 1.9.0 onward are signed with a Developer ID certificate and notarized by Apple, so Gatekeeper does not block them and no terminal step is needed.

On first launch, open System Settings > Privacy & Security and grant the two permissions OpenScreen needs: Screen Recording and Accessibility. Recording cannot start until both are granted.

[!NOTE] macOS 15 and later re-ask for screen-recording permission periodically. That prompt comes from macOS itself and applies to every third-party screen recorder — it is not a sign that anything is wrong with your install or that an update broke something. Grant it again when asked.

[!NOTE] Upgrading from a version older than 1.9.0? Those builds were not signed with a Developer ID certificate, and macOS ties Screen Recording and Accessibility grants to an app's signature — so it cannot tell the new build is the same app, and the permissions you granted the old one do not carry over. If the new version won't record even after you grant them, remove OpenScreen's existing entries under System Settings > Privacy & Security (both Screen Recording and Accessibility), then launch it again and grant them when prompted.

Windows

Recommended — Microsoft Store

Get OpenScreen from the Microsoft Store, or from a terminal:

winget install --source msstore OpenScreen

Microsoft signs the Store package during certification, so it installs with no security warning and updates itself.

Alternative — standalone installer

Download the .exe from the Releases page. Use this if you can't reach the Store — Windows LTSC, a locked-down work machine, an offline install, or if you want a specific older version.

[!NOTE] The .exe is not code-signed, so Windows SmartScreen shows "Windows protected your PC" and reports an unknown publisher. Choose More info → Run anyway to continue.

This is not a sign that something is wrong with the download: an unsigned installer earns SmartScreen's trust per file, so a brand-new build always starts out untrusted no matter how many people installed the previous one. Verifying the signature isn't an option here — there is nothing to verify. If you want the checked path, use the Store build above. If you use the .exe, download it only from the Releases page linked here.

Linux

Four packages are published to the Releases page for each version. Pick the one that matches your distro:

Debian / Ubuntu / Pop!_OS (.deb)

sudo apt install ./Openscreen-Linux-*.deb

Fedora / RHEL / CentOS (.rpm)

sudo dnf install ./Openscreen-Linux-*.rpm

Arch / Manjaro (.pacman)

sudo pacman -U Openscreen-Linux-*.pacman

**Any distro

Frequently asked questions

Is openscreen free to use?

openscreen is open source under the MIT licence. There is no licence fee and no seat count — you can self-host it or, where the project offers one, pay a vendor for a managed version instead.

What does openscreen do?

Record your screen, ship a demo. Free and open-source, GPU-accelerated, no watermarks, no subscriptions. Windows, macOS, Linux. Actively maintained.

What is openscreen written in?

openscreen is primarily written in TypeScript. Its source is publicly available at https://github.com/getopenscreen/openscreen, and it has 3,046 GitHub stars.