Best Mac screen recorders with no watermark or time cap

Product	Best for	Per month, yearly plan	The deciding fact, and the catch	Link
OBS Studio	Best free, no limits	Free	Fully free and open source under GPL-2.0, with no stated limits. It has no built-in editor, so trimming means a second app.	Visit
Kap	Best for GIFs	Free	Free, open source, and exports GIF, MP4, WebM and APNG. Its page gives no pricing, watermark or time-limit details.	Visit
CleanShot X	Best one-time purchase	$10	Basic is $35 once with a year of updates, then $19 a year. Pro is $10 a month billed yearly.	Visit
Screen Studio	Best for polished demos	$9	Exports MP4 up to 4K at 60 fps, but yearly is $9 a month and monthly is $29. One-time licenses aren't sold to new customers.	Visit
Loom	Worst fit for this brief	$15	Free is 25 videos at 5 minutes each, and the logo comes off from Business, at $18 per user a month.	Visit

Use OBS Studio. It's free, it runs on macOS 13 or later, and its project page mentions no limits or watermarks (checked Nov 1, 2026). If you want something simpler, pay $35 for CleanShot X.

One caveat on the word "watermark". Of these five, only Loom's page ties its logo to a plan. For the others, the vendor pages don't mention watermarks, which is not the same as a promise. Check the first export.

You want free and nothing in the way

OBS Studio is GPL-2.0 or later, per its GitHub repository, and also runs on Windows 10 and 11 and Linux. The cost is time. Scenes and sources need manual setup, and there's no editor. Our how to record your screen on a Mac with sound covers the audio side.

Kap is lighter. It needs macOS 12 or later and exports GIF, MP4, WebM or APNG, with optional audio, click highlighting and trimming. It has plugins for Giphy, Vercel and Streamable. Its page says nothing on price, watermarks or time limits, so I'm only calling it free because it's open source.

You'd rather pay once

CleanShot X Basic is $35 as a one-time payment with a year of updates, then $19 a year if you want more. It includes a 1 GB cloud allowance. Pro is $10 per user a month billed yearly, with unlimited cloud storage and a custom domain.

That's Mac only. The plan comparison lists screen recording, a video editor with smart zooms, and 4K quality under both tiers. CleanShot's page says nothing on watermarks.

You make demos for a landing page

Screen Studio exports 4K at 60 fps, with every feature on every plan, and shareable links up to 30 minutes. Yearly costs 9 USD/mo; monthly costs 29 USD/mo. Paying monthly is more than triple.

It's Mac only with no Windows version planned. The page also says one-time licenses are no longer sold to new customers. That's the catch for anyone who found a lifetime-deal review from a few years back.

Why Loom is last

Loom's free plan allows 25 videos per person at 5 minutes each (25 videos per person, 5 min per recording). Loom's page lists branding removal from Business up, which is $18 per user a month. That fails both of your conditions. It's a good tool for sending a quick message, which is a different job. See the Loom review and best screen recorders for async video.

More Mac and Windows options live at other screen recorders in the catalog.