Sharing & backup

1. Send a link (no app needed)

Smart Share turns a recording into a link. Click Smart Share in the editor’s top bar, leave the audience on Anyone with the link, and click Share publicly. The link is copied for you: paste it into Slack, iMessage or email. The person who gets it opens it in a web browser. They do not need OwnClip, and they do not need an account. The first time, OwnClip asks you to sign in to your OwnClip account and to connect your Google Drive. The video is uploaded to your own Drive and plays from there, so it uses your Drive space. It works on the Free plan too.

• Anyone with the link can watch, with no sign-in. Choose Specific people instead and each person needs a Google account, and gets an email from Google Drive
• On the Free plan the page is branded with OwnClip, and the video itself carries the OwnClip watermark, because Free recordings have it recorded in. Pro and Studio recordings made after upgrading are clean
• Studio users can put their own logo, colors and call-to-action on the page with Brand Studio
• View tracking, which shows who watched and for how long, is on every plan
• Changed your mind? Use Disable link on the success card and the link stops working

2. Save a file

Click Export in the editor and pick MP4 unless you know you need something else: it plays on every Mac, PC, phone and website. These formats are open on every plan. The Free plan’s watermark and 720p limit apply to the video itself, not to which format you choose.

• MP4 (H.264) is supported everywhere — best default choice
• Other formats: HEVC (smaller files, newer devices), MOV (QuickTime, Apple apps), WebM (VP9 video with Opus audio, for web pages) and GIF (short silent loops, up to 480p)
• ProRes 422 and 4444 are for editing in Final Cut or Premiere. The files are very large
• Audio only: the export sheet can also save just the sound as WAV, ALAC, FLAC or M4A. M4A is the small one. There is no MP3 option
• Sizes in the picture are examples; the export sheet shows the real estimate

3. Automatic Backup

Backup has its own page in Settings. Switch on a destination and every screenshot and recording you make is copied there as soon as it finishes. Google Drive, iCloud Drive and OneDrive are available on every plan, including Free, and you can run as many at once as you like. Every one of them is an account you own — the copies land in your storage, and the originals stay on your Mac.

• Off until you turn it on — nothing is copied anywhere by default
• The page opens with a status line that tells you whether you are covered, what needs reconnecting, and what has failed
• Copies go to accounts you own, never to an OwnClip server
• There is no schedule to set: the copy happens the moment a capture finishes
• Uploads resume by themselves after a dropped connection, and pick up again when you are back online
• Files already in a destination are never changed or removed — disconnecting one leaves everything there
• Backing up somewhere is not the same as sharing from it: iCloud Drive can hold your copies but cannot produce a share link

• Good to know: Backup covers the screenshots and recordings OwnClip makes — not your projects or your settings
• Good to know: Each destination has its own quota, so a full account stops copying until you make room

4. Storage you ownStudio

Point OwnClip at a bucket you rent and control directly, and your captures are copied there automatically — usually cheaper per terabyte, with no company between you and your files. Pick your provider and OwnClip fills in the address; you add the bucket, the region and a read-write key. The key is stored in your keychain on this Mac and never leaves it except to reach your own storage.

• Presets for Cloudflare R2, Backblaze B2, Wasabi, Amazon and MinIO fill in the address for you — or point at a server you run yourself
• Test the connection before you add the destination
• If a Studio licence lapses the destination is paused, not deleted — your files are untouched and it starts again when the licence does