CleanShot X earned its reputation. For years it has been the answer to "what do you use for screenshots on a Mac", and it still is for a lot of people. So when Droppy's Element Capture learned to record the screen this month, the fair question was not "is it good" but "is it good enough to replace the app everybody already has". This is my attempt at an honest answer, including where CleanShot is still ahead.
The one thing only Droppy does
Most screenshot tools think in rectangles: an area you drag, a window, the screen. Element Capture adds the thing you usually actually want, which is one piece of interface. Hover and the button, sidebar, menu or card under the pointer highlights on its real bounds; click and you have exactly that element, with nothing to crop. For bug reports, documentation and design feedback, it removes the most tedious step of the job.
The rest of the capture set is what you would expect, and it is all there: area, window, full screen, scrolling capture for long pages, a colour picker, and an All-in-one toolbar with its own timer and exact-size fields. Pause screen freezes the display first, for menus and hover states that vanish the moment you move.
The editor
The capture lands in the corner with Copy and Save, the way macOS does it. Open it and the editor has arrows, shapes, text, numbered step stickers that count up by themselves, blur and pixelate for anything private, and crop with aspect ratios whose edges snap to the frame. A background turns a plain shot into something you can post: gradients, colours or a wallpaper, with padding, corners and a shadow, and you can save a look as a preset and apply it in one click.
From there it goes wherever you need it: the clipboard, a folder, straight to a Droppy Cloud link, or onto the shelf or into the Basket to drag somewhere else. Automatic naming can read the text in a capture and name the file after it.
Recording
Record the whole display, one window or an area, with the microphone, system audio and a camera bubble. A transparent window recording keeps its rounded corners and translucency.
The look is applied the moment you stop: a background, padding, corners and shadow, zoom on clicks, click highlights and keystroke captions, and a cursor size of your choosing.
The studio trims and crops, lets the camera follow your pointer or settle softly, times zooms and hidden areas on a timeline, and transcribes the audio.
Export MOV or MP4, copy the video straight to the clipboard, save it to a folder, or keep the project to edit later. A finished recording lands on the same corner card as a screenshot.
Screen recording needs macOS 26 or later.
The zoom that follows your pointer is the feature I care most about, because it is what makes a recording watchable without editing it by hand. Droppy records where the pointer goes and what it clicks, then the studio moves a camera over the recording to follow it, either chasing the pointer or following it softly and settling. You can still add, move or remove any zoom on the timeline.
Where CleanShot X is ahead
CleanShot has more of the specialist's details. It records GIFs, which Droppy does not. It reads QR codes, keeps a capture history, combines several screenshots into one image, and has an editable project format for screenshots. Its cloud has team features, custom domains and single sign-on on the Pro plan. And recording works on older macOS versions, where Droppy's recording needs macOS 26. If any of those is a daily need, CleanShot is the better tool.
Price
| Droppy | CleanShot X | |
|---|---|---|
| Price | $9.99 once | $35 once, or Pro at $10 per user a month, billed yearly |
| Updates | Lifetime | One year with the one-time purchase, then $19 a year to renew |
| Cloud | Droppy Cloud links that expire after 3 days | 1 GB on the one-time plan, unlimited on Pro |
| Macs | Two per license | Per the chosen plan |
| Also includes | The shelf, clipboard, media controls, live activities, Thunderstorm and 38 droplets | A focused capture app |
The comparison that matters is not $9.99 against $35. It is whether you need a second app for screenshots at all once the app at the top of your screen does it well. For most people making a quick bug report, a how-to or a feature clip, Droppy is enough. For people who capture professionally all day, CleanShot remains worth its price.