[opensourcedex]

ShareX is a free, open source screen capture & recording project written in C# and released under GPL-3.0. It has 39,618 GitHub stars, 3,916 forks and 646 open issues, and was last pushed 28 hours ago. On this registry it ranks #2 of 4 tracked projects in Screen Capture & Recording, with 5 head-to-head comparisons available. It gained 69 stars over the last 6 tracked days.

ShareX — Powerful screen capture and file sharing tool for Windows

What is ShareX?

What it is

ShareX is a free and open-source Windows application written in C# that combines screen capture, screen recording, image annotation, file uploading, and productivity utilities into a single lightweight tool. It lives in the Windows desktop productivity ecosystem and is distributed under the GPL-3.0 license with over 39,000 GitHub stars.

It solves the problem of fragmented workflows for users who need to capture, edit, and share visual content quickly. Instead of using separate tools for screenshots, editing, OCR, and file uploads, ShareX integrates these functions into one application with customizable hotkeys and automated post-capture actions. This eliminates context switching and reduces manual steps for developers, technical writers, support teams, and content creators.

Key capabilities

  • Capture any screen area via fullscreen, window, region, scrolling, or GIF recording
  • Annotate screenshots with shapes, arrows, text, blur, pixelation, magnification, and spotlight effects
  • Perform OCR on images to extract text and scan QR codes
  • Upload images, text, files, folders, and clipboard content to built-in or custom destinations (Dropbox, FTP, S3, etc.)
  • Edit screenshots in a built-in image editor with crop, redact, highlight, and effects tools
  • Configure hotkeys to trigger capture, upload, or custom task chains with minimal interaction
  • Extract colors, use a screen color picker, ruler, and pin tools for desktop productivity

Who uses it and how

Developers use it to capture bug reports, annotate code errors, and upload logs or stack traces to private servers. Technical writers and support teams create annotated screenshots for documentation, tutorials, and customer replies, redacting sensitive data before sharing. QA testers record GIFs of UI behaviors and upload them directly to issue trackers or internal storage. Designers pick colors, measure elements, and export annotated assets for handoff. Power users automate multi-step workflows—capture, edit, upload, copy URL—via hotkeys.

Getting started

Install via the official installer from https://getsharex.com or use package managers like Chocolatey (choco install sharex) or winget. No account or configuration is required to begin; default settings enable immediate capture and upload to common services.

When to use it — and when not to

Use ShareX when you need a privacy-focused, ad-free, self-hosted screen capture and file sharing tool with deep customization and automation. Avoid it if you require native macOS or Linux support (it is Windows-only), or if you need enterprise-grade collaboration features like shared workspaces or version history. Self-hosting requires configuring upload destinations manually (e.g., S3 bucket credentials, FTP details), and OCR accuracy depends on image quality and language packs.

project readme (upstream, from github) — read inline

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Screen capture, file sharing and productivity tool


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ShareX Screenshot

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ShareX - Free Screen Capture, Screenshot, File Sharing and Productivity Tool

ShareX is a free and open source screenshot tool, screen recorder, file sharing tool and productivity application for Windows. It is designed for users who need fast screen capture, powerful screenshot editing, automated sharing, custom upload destinations and practical utilities in one lightweight desktop app.

With ShareX, you can capture any area of your screen, record video or GIFs, annotate screenshots, upload files, copy shareable links, extract text with OCR, scan QR codes, pick colors and run custom workflows from hotkeys. ShareX is built for speed and control: capture a screenshot, edit it, save it, copy it, upload it or pass it through your own task chain with minimal manual work.

Why ShareX?

ShareX combines screen capture, screen recording, image editing, file uploading and automation features that are often split across multiple applications. It is completely free, open source, lightweight, privacy focused and has no advertisements. No account is required to use ShareX.

ShareX is especially useful for developers, designers, support teams, content creators, technical writers, QA testers and power users who frequently create screenshots, record short clips, share files or document workflows. It can be used as a simple screenshot app, but it also supports advanced workflows for users who want precise control over capture methods, after-capture tasks, upload destinations and hotkeys.

Screenshot and Screen Recording Features

ShareX supports many ways to capture your screen:

  • Fullscreen capture
  • Active window capture
  • Active monitor capture
  • Region capture
  • Scrolling screenshot capture
  • Last region capture
  • Custom region capture
  • Screen recording
  • GIF screen recording
  • Auto capture

After capturing a screenshot or recording, ShareX can automatically copy the result to the clipboard, save it to a file, open it in the image editor, upload it, print it, show it in Windows Explorer, run an action, scan a QR code or recognize text with OCR. These after-capture tasks make ShareX a flexible screenshot workflow tool instead of only a basic snipping utility.

Region Capture and Annotation

ShareX region capture includes tools for selecting exactly what you want to capture and marking it before saving, copying or uploading. You can draw rectangles, ellipses, freehand lines, arrows, text, speech balloons, step numbers, highlights, blur effects, pixelation, magnification and spotlight effects.

These annotation tools help create clear screenshots for bug reports, documentation, tutorials, support replies, pull requests and release notes. Sensitive information can be hidden with blur, pixelate or smart eraser tools before a screenshot is shared.

Built-in Image Editor

The ShareX image editor lets you crop, annotate, redact, highlight and prepare screenshots after capture. It includes common editing tools such as shapes, arrows, text, freehand drawing, image insertion, cursor insertion, blur, pixelate, magnify, spotlight, crop, cut out, background editing and image effects.

Because the editor is part of the capture workflow, you can take a screenshot, mark the important area, hide private details and then copy, save or upload the edited image without switching between separate apps.

File Sharing and Upload Automation

ShareX can upload images, text, files, folders, clipboard content and URLs to many different destinations. After uploading, it can automatically copy the URL to the clipboard, open the URL, shorten the URL, show a QR code or run other configured tasks.

Advanced users can create custom uploaders for services that are not built in. ShareX also provides guides for destinations such as Amazon S3, Google Cloud Storage and Cloudflare R2, making it suitable for both personal screenshot sharing and team workflows where files need to be uploaded to controlled storage.

Productivity Tools

ShareX includes many utilities that support everyday desktop work:

  • Color picker
  • Screen color picker
  • Ruler
  • Pin to screen
  • Image editor
  • Image beautifier
  • Image effects
  • Image viewer
  • Background remover
  • Image comparer
  • Image combiner
  • Image splitter
  • Image thumbnailer
  • Video converter
  • Video thumbnailer
  • Analyze image
  • OCR for recognizing text in images
  • QR code
  • Hash checker
  • Metadata viewer
  • Directory indexer
  • Clipboard viewer
  • Borderless window
  • Inspect window
  • Monitor test

These tools make ShareX useful beyond screenshots. It can help inspect images, prepare assets, extract information, verify files and speed up repetitive tasks.

Custom Workflows and Hotkeys

ShareX is built around configurable workflows. You can assign hotkeys to capture methods, choose what happens after capture, decide what happens after upload and create actions that run external tools or scripts. This makes it possible to build a workflow such as capture region, annotate image, save locally, upload to a destination, shorten the URL and copy the final link to the clipboard.

The workflow system is one of the main reasons ShareX is popular with power users. Simple tasks can stay simple, while advanced users can automate detailed screenshot, screen recording and file sharing processes.

Download ShareX

ShareX is available from the official website, GitHub releases, Microsoft Store and Steam. You can install the regular setup version, use a portable version or try development builds if you want the newest changes before a stable release.

For the safest download options, use the official links below.

Links

Documents

Frequently asked questions

Is ShareX free to use?

ShareX is open source under the GPL-3.0 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 ShareX do?

Powerful screen capture and file sharing tool for Windows

What is ShareX written in?

ShareX is primarily written in C#. Its source is publicly available at https://github.com/ShareX/ShareX, and it has 39,618 GitHub stars.