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Looking for a Screen Charm alternative?
Screen Charm is free to record with and $99 to export from, paid once. Prequel is $29 once for the same kind of licence, or $9 a month, and the seven-day trial has the export in it. The difference is on screen: zooms on what you type as well as where you click, a perspective tilt, focus falling away from the subject, and 4K at 120 fps against their 4K 60.
No credit card required
Screen Charm
Screen recorder for Mac. Cinematic by default.
- Price
- $99 once, up to three Macs
- Free
- Free to download and record with; export needs the licence
- Platforms
- macOS 14+, Apple Silicon
Prequel
Cinematic screen recorder for Mac
- Price
- $9 a month, or $29 once
- Free
- 7-day trial, then paid
- Platforms
- macOS 14+, Apple Silicon
Checked on 8 October 2026 against Screen Charm, Screen Charm changelog, Screen Charm vs Screen Studio, by Screen Charm, Screen Charm's Screen Studio alternatives post, Screen Charm 1.11.4 installer, Screen Charm on Product Hunt, Show HN: Mac screen recorder that adds zoom animations from click data.
What is Screen Charm, and what is it good at?
Screen Charm is a one-person Mac screen recorder that edits the take for you. Record a display, a window or an area with the camera, the microphone and the Mac's own sound, and every click gets a zoom with motion blur on it, the cursor is smoothed, and the window sits on a gradient, a photo or inside a MacBook frame. Captions, blur regions, a teleprompter, background music and a split vertical layout for Shorts are in the editor.
Sergey Nazarov has shipped it since July 2025, usually a release every couple of weeks, and it reached #4 Product of the Day on Product Hunt in June 2026. It costs $99, once, for up to three Macs, and there is no subscription.
If one payment is the whole requirement and the MacBook frame or the music library is the look you want, Screen Charm does that well.
Why do people look for a Screen Charm alternative?
Two things, mostly.
You can record and edit for free, and then you cannot export. The app is free to download and record with. The finished video stays inside it until you have paid the $99, so the first time you see your own export is after the purchase. There is a 14-day refund if it is not what you hoped, but that is a refund, not a trial.
$99 is the dearest one-off licence in this category. The field under it is busy: Cap is $58 once, CleanShot X is $35, Prequel is $29, and there is a new auto-zoom Mac recorder on Show HN every few weeks, most of them under $30. Screen Charm's own answer to that is the frequency of its releases, which is fair, and the price went up from $79 to $99 in the autumn of 2026 rather than down.
Is Prequel a good Screen Charm alternative?
For the video, yes, and for the same kind of licence at a third of the money.
Prequel records the screen, the camera, the microphone and system audio as separate tracks and opens the editor with the first pass made: zooms placed on every click and every burst of typing, tilted, with focus falling away from whatever the push-in is aimed at. The camera is framed and shaped afterwards. A background is applied with padding and a shadow. The cursor is smoothed, blurred as it moves and hidden when it idles. Captions are transcribed on your Mac with nothing uploaded.
Export is one MP4 or HEVC file at up to 4K and 120 frames a second, encoded by the Mac's own media engine, against Screen Charm's 4K 60. The download is 104 MB against their 237.
On price it is $29 once, which is the one-off licence Screen Charm sells for $99, or $9 a month if you would rather not commit. The seven-day trial is the whole app, export included, so the files you make in that week are yours whether or not you pay afterwards.
What do you give up by switching?
The MacBook device frame and the built-in music library. Screen Charm wraps a recording in a laptop and lets you pick a track from a bundled set; Prequel puts a frame of padding, a radius, a border and a shadow round the recording and leaves the music to you.
Both need an Apple Silicon Mac on macOS 14 or later, so there is nothing to weigh there.
How do the features compare?
| Feature | Prequel | Screen Charm |
|---|---|---|
| Automatic zoom on clicks | Included | Included |
| Zoom on what you type | Included | Not included |
| Cursor smoothing and resizing | Included | Included |
| Camera overlay, shaped and placed after | Included | Included |
| Backgrounds, padding and shadow | Included | Included |
| Layouts for the screen and camera | Fourteen, per clip | A floating bubble, or pinned to an edge |
| Camera cut out of its background | Included | Background replacement inside the overlay |
| Perspective tilt and focus falloff on zooms | Included | Not included |
| Captions transcribed on your Mac | Included | Generated in the app; where is not stated |
| Timeline editing | Included | Trim, split, mute and speed, per clip |
| Separate audio tracks | Included | Not stated |
| System audio without a virtual driver | Included | Included |
| Reframe to vertical without cropping | Included | A split layout; the screen crops to follow the cursor |
| Magnifying-glass loupe over the work | Included | Not included |
| Colour looks and filters | Included | Not included |
| Microphone noise reduction | Included | Included |
| Import a video you already have | Included | Not included |
| Records and exports without uploading | Included | Records locally; shareable links upload |
| Shareable links | Included | Yes, 2 GB per upload |
| Team workspace | Included | Not included |
| Records an iPhone or iPad | Not included | Not included |
| Maximum export | 4K, 120 fps | 4K, 60 fps |
| Download size | 104 MB | 237 MB |
| Platforms | macOS 14+, Apple Silicon | macOS 14+, Apple Silicon |
| Licence | $9/month or $29 once, 7-day trial | $99 once, up to three Macs |
What Screen Charm is good at
One payment for three Macs, a MacBook frame round the recording, a built-in music library, and a maker who has shipped a release most fortnights since July 2025.
What does each one cost?
Screen Charm
- Lifetime$99 one-off, up to three Macs
Prequel
- Lifetime$29 once
- Pro$9 a month
Checked on 8 October 2026 against Screen Charm, Screen Charm changelog, Screen Charm vs Screen Studio, by Screen Charm, Screen Charm's Screen Studio alternatives post, Screen Charm 1.11.4 installer, Screen Charm on Product Hunt, Show HN: Mac screen recorder that adds zoom animations from click data.
- Record your screen and cameraPick a display, a window or an area you drag out, with your camera, microphone and system audio each on their own track.
- Zooms and layout are applied automaticallyPrequel reads where you clicked and typed, then places the zooms, frames your camera and sets a background behind it.
- Edit, export and shareMove a zoom, trim a clip or fix a caption, then export one MP4 at up to 4K or send a link that plays anywhere.
Zoom and pan
Zooms that follow the action
Prequel automatically zooms in when you click or type, then softens the rest of the window so viewers know where to look. Every zoom is added to the timeline, so you can move, retime or delete it at any time.
Layouts
Switch layouts clip by clip
Choose from fourteen layouts for the same take: camera in the corner, beside the screen, split with it or hidden entirely. Use one layout for the whole video, or change it clip by clip.
Subtitles
Subtitles you can edit like text
Prequel transcribes every word on your Mac when the editor opens. Fix captions by typing in the transcript, choose a subtitle style or delete a sentence to remove it from the video.
Thisisthecheckoutweshippedlastweek
Thisisthecheckoutweshippedlastweek
Thisisthecheckoutweshippedlastweek
Thisisthecheckoutweshippedlastweek
Thisisthecheckoutweshippedlastweek
Thisisthecheckoutweshippedlastweek
Thanks so much for jumping on this call
Iwanttoshowyousomethingcool
[pause here]
we’ve been building for the past few months
Teleprompter
A teleprompter that follows your voice
Prequel hangs your script from the notch, just under the camera, and follows your voice — the word you're saying lights up as you say it. Wander off script and it waits for you; skip ahead or fall behind and it catches up within a couple of words.
Instant edit
Start with the edit already done
Prequel records where you click and type, then opens the editor with zooms already placed, a framed camera and a polished background. Spend less time building the first cut and more time fine-tuning.
- Zooms placedOn every click and every burst of typing
- Camera framedShaped, sized and set in a corner
- Background appliedPadding, radius, border and shadow
- Audio balancedMicrophone and system on separate gains
- Cursor cleaned upSmoothed, resized, hidden when it idles
The editor
Everything you would have done by hand
It opens by itself when you stop recording, on the take you just made. Nothing to import, nothing to line up.
Guide attention automatically
Prequel zooms into the part of the screen that matters: the cursor, a region you draw, or whatever you are typing into. Set the level, the speed and how much the rest of the frame blurs.
Look present without taking over the video
Your camera stays framed and out of the way: circle, squircle, rounded, wide or portrait, in any corner and any size. It is never burned into the recording, so none of it is decided while you record.
Make recordings look designed
Add a background, padding and a shadow without editing any of it by hand. Your own wallpaper by default, seven bundled presets, gradients and solids.
Cut the parts nobody needs to see
Trim the pauses yourself, slice by slice, with a waveform under every clip. Layout, background and audio can all change mid-take.
Keep the pointer out of the way
Fifteen pointer styles, resized so the cursor survives a zoom. Smoothed while it travels, and hidden after a few seconds of stillness.
Export the frame you approved
The preview and the exporter draw the same plan, so the file matches what you signed off in the editor.
Quality
Videos stay sharp at 4K
Capture and export run on your Mac's own media engine. 1080p at 60 fps records without dropping frames, and 4K is a setting you pick.
- Resolution
- Up to 4K
- Frame rate
- Up to 120 fps
- Codecs
- H.264 · HEVC
- Encoding
- Hardware, VideoToolbox
- Compositing
- Metal
- Output
- Constant frame rate MP4
Formats
Export in any frame
Turn one recording into different formats without manually reframing every element. Switch from landscape to vertical and the layout stays intact.
- Landscape 16:9
- 4K
- Vertical 9:16
- Square 1:1
- Portrait 4:5
- YouTube
- Shorts
- TikTok
- Reels
- X
Record demos worth sharing
Free for 7 days. No watermark on anything you export.
No credit card required
Curious about the internals? Read the blog
FAQ
Zooms, exports and the rest
What is the best Screen Charm alternative?
Prequel, if what sent you looking was finishing a video and finding the export behind the $99. It makes the same automatic pass on a recording, adds a perspective tilt and focus falling away from the subject, zooms on what you type as well as where you click, and exports at up to 4K and 120 fps where Screen Charm stops at 60. It is $29 once or $9 a month, and the seven-day trial is the whole app with the export in it, so the files you make in that week are yours either way.
How much does Screen Charm cost?
$99, once, with no subscription. The licence covers up to three Macs, includes future updates, and comes with a 14-day money-back guarantee. There is one tier and no free plan: the app is free to download and record with, and exporting the finished video needs the purchase. It was $79 until the autumn of 2026. Checked on 8 October 2026.
Can you export from Screen Charm without paying?
No. Recording and editing are free and there is no time limit on them, but the finished video stays inside the app until the $99 licence is bought. Prequel's seven-day trial includes export, with no watermark, on every size and frame rate the paid app has.
Is Screen Charm better for anything?
A MacBook device frame round the recording, a built-in library of background music, and a licence that covers three Macs. If the laptop-frame look is the point, that is Screen Charm's. Prequel frames the recording with padding, a radius, a border and a shadow over a background instead, and leaves the music to you.
Does Screen Charm work on an Intel Mac?
No. Screen Charm needs an Apple Silicon Mac on macOS Sonoma 14.0 or later, and so does Prequel. On an Intel Mac, OBS Studio runs on macOS 12 and later on both chips, and QuickTime Player is already installed.
Can I open my Screen Charm recordings in Prequel?
Not the project files, which are Screen Charm's own format. A video you have already exported is an ordinary MP4 and can be brought into a Prequel project with Add Clip, then cut and framed alongside anything else; its zooms are burned in, so those cannot be re-timed. For a two-minute demo, re-recording the take is usually quicker than working round a finished file.