CleanShot X vs Monosnap

CleanShot X

• Mac users who take and annotate many screenshots
• Buyers who prefer a one-time license to a subscription
• Support and product teams sharing quick captures by link

Monosnap

• Annotated screenshots with arrows, text and blur on Mac or Windows
• People who keep captures in their own Dropbox, S3 or FTP storage
• Home users who need screenshots and short clips at no cost

CleanShot X

• macOS only, requiring macOS 13.0 or newer. The vendor says there are no plans for a Windows version.
• There is no free trial; purchases are covered by a 30-day money-back guarantee.
• The $35 Basic license includes one year of updates; later updates need an optional $19 per year renewal.
• Unlimited cloud storage, custom domains, team features, SSO and SCIM need the Pro subscription.

Monosnap

• The Free and Non-Commercial plans are for personal use only; any commercial use needs the Commercial plan.
• Free accounts are limited to 5 minutes of video recording, 2 GB of storage and 100 MB per upload, and lose the cloud integrations after 30 days.
• Mac App Store purchases are priced separately, at $4.49 a month or $44.99 a year for the non-commercial version.
• Apps are offered for Mac, Windows and Chrome only; no Linux or mobile app is listed.

CleanShot X

Screenshots and scrolling capture

Capture an area, a window, the full screen or scrolling content in either direction, with a self-timer, crosshair and magnifier.

Screen recording

Record to MP4 or GIF with microphone and computer audio, a camera overlay, and keystrokes and clicks shown on screen.

Built-in video editor

Add zooms, refine cursor movement and adjust backgrounds on a screen recording without leaving the app.

Annotation and backgrounds

Highlight or hide parts of a screenshot, add annotations, and place captures on styled backgrounds from 20 presets.

Text recognition

Copy text out of any image and read QR codes, with on-device recognition in more than 30 languages.

CleanShot Cloud

Upload a capture to get a share link with password protection, self-destruct timers and video transcription. Basic has 1 GB; Pro is unlimited.

Monosnap

Screenshot capture

Captures the full screen, part of it or a selected window, with an 8x magnifier for exact crop edges, customizable hotkeys and delayed screenshots.

Annotation editor

Highlights details with a pen, text, arrows and shapes and blurs private information. A capture can also be opened in an external editor.

Video and GIF recording

Records screencasts and GIFs and can highlight details while recording. The Free plan allows 5 minutes of video; paid plans are unlimited.

Monosnap storage and short links

Uploads a capture or any dropped file to Monosnap's cloud and returns a short link. Storage is 2 GB on Free and starts at 10 GB on paid plans.

External storage integrations

Paid plans can send captures to Dropbox, Google Drive, Box, Evernote, Yandex.Disk, Amazon S3, FTP, sFTP or WebDAV. Free accounts get this for 30 days.

Team accounts and private links

The Commercial plan adds a team account and private links. Enterprise adds single sign-on, advanced access control and central settings control.

CleanShot X

• CleanShot Basic$35

  one-time payment; optional update renewal at $19 per year

  The Mac app to keep, with one year of updates and 1 GB of CleanShot Cloud storage. A license is active on one Mac at a time.

• CleanShot Pro$10

  per user / month, billed annually

  Always up to date, with unlimited cloud storage, custom domain and branding, team features, SSO and SCIM.

Monosnap

• Free$0

  Personal and family use only: unlimited screenshots, 5 minutes of video recording, 2 GB of storage and a 100 MB limit per uploaded file.

• Non-Commercial$2.5

  per month, billed yearly; $3 billed monthly

  Still personal use only: unlimited video recording, 10 GB or more of storage, a 2 GB upload limit and integrations with external cloud services.

• Commercial$5

  per user / month, billed yearly; $10 billed monthly

  Licensed for commercial use, with a team account, private links, 10 GB or more of storage per member and the cloud integrations.

• EnterpriseCustom

  Single sign-on, advanced access control, settings control, a tailored SLA and custom contracts and invoicing, arranged through sales.

CleanShot X

• Lifetime license

  One-time license for $35

  CleanShot Basic is a pay-once license that keeps working indefinitely. It includes one year of updates, and renewing updates afterwards is optional at $19 per year.

• Annual discount

  17% off Pro with yearly billing

  The pricing page marks yearly billing for CleanShot Pro as 17% cheaper than monthly, at $10 per user per month billed annually.

• Education

  30% educational discount

  Entering a university-issued email address gives 30% off. For Cloud Pro or update renewals, CleanShot asks students to email from their university address.

• Other savings

  20% off for PixelSnap customers

  Existing PixelSnap 2 customers get 20% off CleanShot, according to the pricing page.

• Other savings

  Included with Setapp

  CleanShot is also available through a Setapp subscription, which bundles it with more than 200 other apps.

Monosnap

• Annual discount

  Save up to 50% with yearly billing

  The pricing page lists Non-Commercial at $2.5 a month billed yearly against $3 monthly (16% off), and Commercial at $5 against $10 (50% off).

• Lifetime license

  Lifetime non-commercial license for $99.99

  The Mac App Store listing offers the paid non-commercial version as a lifetime purchase for $99.99, alongside monthly and yearly subscriptions.