Free Screen Recorder Without a Watermark: Windows and Mac

“Free” stays on the OBS and ShareX homepages

The OBS homepage says “Free and open source software for video recording and live streaming” and “Download and start streaming quickly and easily on Windows, Mac or Linux.” The same page says Windows supports Windows 10 and Windows 11, and macOS supports macOS 13.0 or newer. The download page repeats the Windows 10 and 11 and macOS 13.0 lines, and it adds an official Linux Flatpak and a PPA for Ubuntu 26.04 and newer. Both pages list version 33.0.0 and October 23rd, with no year beside the date. The ShareX homepage is a Windows page. It says the tool is free and open source, with screen recording among its features, and the labels say completely free, no advertisements, free forever, and no account required. Snipping Tool, Xbox Game Bar, Screenshot, and QuickTime Player are described on Microsoft and Apple pages that do not display a price and do not say free. This guide does not move the OBS or ShareX price words onto those pages.

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A recording watermark has to be a sentence on the page

The OBS homepage, download page, quick start, sources guide, and macOS Screen Capture page do not use the word watermark. The ShareX homepage does not mention a watermark on a screen recording. The screen-recording bullets in the ShareX 22.0.0 changelog do not use the word. The Snipping Tool, Game Bar, Screenshot, and QuickTime pages checked here do not use it either. Silence is not a test of a saved file. This guide did not record a clip, did not open an output, and does not say that a file is free of a mark. A separate checklist on this site is the place to inspect a file you export yourself. The pages read here do not name Camtasia, Loom, or a dollar amount, so this guide does not add those claims.

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ShareX’s image watermark tool marks images

The image watermark page says the tool applies a text or image watermark to one or more images, with a live preview and controls for placement, margin, opacity, rotation, and output encoding. Open it from Tools, then Image watermark. Choose Text or Image, choose PNG or JPEG, and review the preview before Apply. The page says the default filename pattern adds _watermarked. The homepage lists Image watermark under Images, beside other image tools. The 22.0.0 changelog lists Image watermark under Images, after the screen-recording bullets, not inside them. Using that tool is a choice to mark images. It is not the screen-recording method named Screen recording or Screen recording (GIF), and it is not evidence about a recording file the tool was not asked to mark.

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Windows 11 has a rectangle, Windows 10’s section does not list video, and Game Bar starts from a game or an app

The Snipping Tool page applies to Windows 11 and Windows 10, and the two sections do not list the same snips. The Windows 11 video snip is a rectangular selection of any part of the screen. The steps are Record, then New, or Windows logo key + Shift + R, then the area, Start, and Stop. After Stop, the page says you can save the recording as-is or select Edit in Clipchamp. The Windows 10 section lists a free-form snip, a rectangular snip, a window snip, and a full-screen snip. It does not list a video snip. Xbox Game Bar’s article, in both its Windows 11 and Windows 10 sections, says to record a video clip of a game or an app. Go to the game or app, then Windows key + Alt + R. The microphone toggle is Windows key + Alt + M. The saved file is an MP4 in Videos, in Captures, and the file name contains the game or app name plus the date and time. The article does not give a desktop or File Explorer procedure. That boundary is the subject of the separate Game Bar guide. Audio controls that differ between the Snipping Tool help page and the 2023 Insider post stay on the Windows audio guide. This page does not repeat them as a new fact.

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On a Mac, Screenshot is the Record toolbar and QuickTime opens it

The Mac User Guide welcome page is titled for macOS 27. The Screenshot article in that guide says Shift-Command-5, or Spotlight, opens Screenshot. The record tools are the entire screen, a window, or a portion. Options include where to save the file, a timer, the microphone or None, the floating thumbnail, the last selection, Capture Format HDR or SDR, and the mouse pointer. Click Record. The stop control’s name on the page is the Stop Recording button, in the menu bar. Screen recordings are .mov files. Names begin with “Screen Recording” and include the date and time. QuickTime Player’s record page says File > New Screen Recording opens Screenshot and displays the tools, then the same Record and Stop Recording button. It says you can open the recording in the app and save it on your Mac. The QuickTime welcome page says an entire screen or a portion. It does not print Record a window. That name stays on the Screenshot page. The QuickTime page does not repeat the .mov sentence. Neither page displays a price or uses the word watermark. A microphone on the Screenshot page is not a sentence about the Mac’s internal sound. That difference stays on the existing Mac sound guide.

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OBS names a different source for Windows and for current macOS

The quick start’s source list is the practical split: Display Capture or Window Capture on Windows and Linux, macOS Screen Capture on macOS, and Game Capture on Windows only. The sources guide is more specific about the operating system. Display Capture is an entire display on Windows, Linux, and macOS 12.6 and prior. On macOS 13, that guide says to use macOS Screen Capture. Its macOS Screen Capture line says the source captures a display, a window, or an application, including desktop audio on macOS 13 and later. The macOS Screen Capture page says the source can capture a whole display, a single window, or all visible windows for a chosen application, and that on macOS 13 and later it can also capture audio. That page also says the source is available with audio on macOS 13+ and available without audio on macOS 12.3-12.6. The homepage’s current macOS line is 13.0 or newer, which is the system the sources guide sends to macOS Screen Capture rather than Display Capture. Version 33.0.0 and October 23rd are the homepage and download lines checked on 29 October 2026. The quick start still prints 2021-08-25, and the sources guide still prints 2022-01-11. This guide does not treat those older page dates as a claim that version 33.0.0 changed the button names. Desktop audio and the microphone by default, and separate tracks, stay on the OBS audio guides. This page only says the quick start’s default is both, together.

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ShareX 22.0.0 names the recorder bar and a stability warning

The changelog entry dated 2026-10-20 says native screen recording without relying on FFmpeg is enabled by default. The recording bullets name system audio, microphone audio, and camera overlays, and a screen recorder bar with Start delay, System audio, Microphone, Camera, Cursor, and Mouse highlighter. They raise the screen recording FPS limit to 120, and the entry says we expect this release to be significantly less stable than our usual releases. The homepage’s capture methods still include Screen recording and Screen recording (GIF). Those two pages do not print which menu starts a recording. A click path is not supplied here. ShareX remains the Windows tool the homepage describes. It is not the OBS page, and it is not the Mac Screenshot page.

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Scope of this guide

We read the linked OBS, ShareX, Microsoft, and Apple pages on 29 October 2026 and wrote this guide from them. We did not install, open, or time OBS Studio, ShareX, Snipping Tool, Xbox Game Bar, Screenshot, or QuickTime Player, and nothing here is a hands-on recording or an inspected file. Menus can differ by app version and operating system; check what your own screen shows. “Free” is used only where the OBS or ShareX homepage prints it. The Microsoft and Apple pages checked do not display a price. A page that does not mention a watermark on a saved recording is not a statement that the file has none. The ShareX image watermark page applies a mark to images. It is not a screen-recording result.