Capto vs OBS Studio
Both are bought outright, both sit in capture, and both are bought by people leaving Loom paid plans, Camtasia subscription. Here is what actually differs — including what each price does not buy.
The short answer
- OBS Studio is free; Capto costs $29.99.
- Capto has the cleaner licence: buy once, own forever, against free and open source for OBS Studio.
Side by side
 Capto$29.99Perpetual |  OBS StudioFreeOpen source | |
|---|---|---|
| What it is | screen capture, recording and light video editing for one payment | free screen recording and live streaming with no limits or watermark |
| Price | $29.99 | Free |
| Licence | Buy once, own forever | Free and open source |
| What you get | One payment. Updates included, indefinitely. | No licence to buy, and the source is public. |
| The catch | The $29.99 tier is the discounted pack; the two full unlocks are $49.99 | No editor and no official support — scenes and macOS audio routing are yours to set up |
| Macs per licence | not established | not established |
| Account required | no | no |
| Works offline | yes | yes |
| Apple Silicon | Yes | Yes |
| Free trial | Yes | No |
| On Setapp | Yes | No |
| Minimum macOS | not established | macOS 12 |
| App Store rating | not established | not established |
| Last updated | not established | not established |
| Price checked | 2026-09-22 | 2026-09-22 |
Apple’s public API reports a rating for only a small minority of Mac apps, and returns zero for most of the rest even when the store page plainly shows reviews. A blank here means we could not read a number, never that an app is unrated or disliked.
In their own right
Capto
Capto pairs screenshots and screen, webcam or iOS-device recording with an annotation editor, a simple timeline and a library that files every capture. It sits between a screenshot tool and a full screencast editor, and it is sold as a one-time unlock rather than a subscription.
OBS Studio
OBS Studio records and streams anything on a Mac: scenes built from window, display, camera and audio sources, filters, and a large plugin ecosystem. Free under the GPL, with no watermark, no length limit and no account.