161

I am often copying and pasting various tidbits of information, and then forgetting to save it. I would copy something else and lose what I had in the clipboard before.

Is there some sort of built-in way to view the history of the clipboard, or do I have to install a program?

Improve this question
4
  • 2
    I've tried a few 3rd-party programs, but actually found none that clears its history based on time rather than based on some number of entries. I don't want my Mac to remember the last xx copy actions, but want it to remember the last xx minutes. (Or, even if the number of entries is limited: at least remove the history after some time.)
    – Arjan
    Aug 2, 2009 at 12:26
  • 3
    @Arjan - sounds like you should write that app.
    – Darren Newton
    Aug 3, 2009 at 12:12
  • @Arjan or hire somebody on fiverr to do it.. used to be $5 might be a bit more now but not much
    – barlop
    Jul 2, 2019 at 0:23
  • I recommend CopyQ as it is open source, and I like the extra power of its features eg being able to inspect the clipboard for text or html properties. Instructions on how to install via Homebrew are here: hluk.github.io/CopyQ
    – Bastion
    Jul 15, 2021 at 4:18

13 Answers 13

Reset to default
89

There's a multitude of applications that do this, but no built-in feature.

  1. Maccy

    • Open source and free.
    • Supports searching through your clipboard history.
    • Install via: brew install --cask maccy

  2. Jumpcut

    • Open source and free.
    • Simple and straightforward.
    • Install via: brew install --cask jumpcut.

  3. Flycut (Mac App Store link)

    • An open source and free fork of Jumpcut with a few added features.
    • Freely available in the Mac App Store.
    • Install via: brew install --cask flycut.

    FlyCut, an open source fork of Jumpcut

  4. Copy 'em Paste

    • A paid, but simple and cheap alternative. Tries to do exactly one thing well.

    Screenshot of Copy' em Paste on the right

  5. Alfred Powerpack

    • Another paid alternative, with great clipboard history management as part of its pack. See Dan Udeys answer.

  6. Paste

    • Another paid alternative, but requires an annual subscription.
    • Features synchronised clipboard history between Apple devices.

  7. Clyppan.

    Used to be open source, then closed source and available in the Mac App Store (for approx. £2), but is now no longer available for download.

Improve this answer
7
  • 2
    This may not be a requirement for everyone, but neither Clyppan nor Jumpcut have some time-limited history. (I just opened Clyppan after not using it for some time, and it gave me my history of May 24th...)
    – Arjan
    Aug 2, 2009 at 12:59
  • 3
    Clyppan is now proprietary...
    – thSoft
    Aug 4, 2011 at 23:29
  • 1
    Flycut is awesome!
    – Dolphin
    Jul 24, 2014 at 11:37
  • Clyppan was excellent, but is no longer under development and has some bugs in Yosemite.
    – Dalin
    Apr 20, 2015 at 13:41
  • Now I'm in love with this one -- apprywhere.com/copy-em-paste.html -- though I was last using Flycut, which does work nicely but it's a bit too simple. Copy 'Em Paste is insanely good, IMHO... of course, everyone has different needs, especially for this kind of util
    – Dan Rosenstark
    May 14, 2015 at 0:29
33

I realise that the question has been answered, but here is another recommendation for a clipboard history manager:

ClipMenu

Menubar item:

alt text

Hovering menu (hotkey):

alt text

Apart from the menubar and floating window, it also has customisable 'actions' that allow you to manipulate text as you paste it (e.g., uppercase everything), and support for snippets to hold commonly pasted text.

In my experiences it is easily the best of the simple clipboard managers.

Improve this answer
9
25

The best I've found is Alfred, which has a phenomenal clipboard history functionality as part of its ($15) Powerpack. Among its features:

  1. Clearing history by time (e.g. 'keep only 7 days')
  2. Ignore apps (so text copied from Keychain, 1password, etc. isn't saved to the history)
  3. Snippets (for commonly pasted text)
  4. Clipboard merging (merge the current clipboard item with the previous)
  5. Max clipboard size (up to 'unlimited')

I bought it for other reasons, but I use the clipboard history every few minutes throughout my day, so for $15 it was a pretty big win.

Improve this answer
21

I was used to ClipMenu, because I need a list of history items visible I don't want to waste time browsing thru history. However ClipMenu was not updated for years now, and dropbox links don't work anymore. I was able to find backed-up dmg file on one Japanese website, but what eventually solved my problem is a clone of ClipMenu called Clipy

enter image description here

So you can download and install it manually or via brew cask

brew install --cask clipy
Improve this answer
1
  • 3
    Thank you for the brew version, it's just amazing!
    – DimaSan
    Nov 12, 2018 at 0:48
11

The perennial answer to OS X questions: Quicksilver

enter image description here

See these Quicksilver clipboard tutorials:

Improve this answer
6
  • 1
    this is amazing!
    – Pierre Spring
    Aug 22, 2009 at 14:36
  • 1
    +1 So hard to explain QS, impossible to live without it
    – trolle3000
    May 25, 2010 at 12:44
  • 2
    Both the QS Shelf and Clipboard managers have been broken since Leopard came out. They will open continuously and annoyingly until you shut them off.
    – Brandon
    Sep 25, 2011 at 20:35
  • 3
    I don't know about Leopard, but on Mountain Lion Clipboard History works without a problem.
    – user664833
    Oct 14, 2012 at 18:50
  • 2
    I find that any time I have the QS clipboard plugin enabled that almost every QS action becomes unbearably slow.
    – wfaulk
    Dec 10, 2014 at 18:03
11

I've tried them all and the best experience and best ongoing support has been from LaunchBar.

Best feature: 40-item clipboard history. It makes writing code so much easier.

LaunchBar Screenshot

Improve this answer
7

I wrote CmdVees to scratch my own itch.

It works like a stack. You can copy several items in sequence (like any clipboard manager) but when you hit Cmd-v, the pasted item is removed from the stack. LIFO. It may sounds weird, I guess it depends on how your brain works. For me is very natural.

It can be configured to work like a queue, FIFO, for the other brain model.

Also, it splits entries in history by time, hiding older items in a submenu:

enter image description here

To be honest I don't use the menu more than once in a while.

It has other goodies like joining items or swap top of the stack with selection.

It's a commercial app but feel free to ask me for a license if you fall in love with the trial and you can't afford it.

Improve this answer
5
  • 8
    A stack is not FIFO.
    – Nicolas Barbulesco
    Oct 20, 2013 at 8:53
  • This supports LIFO and FIFO
    – circuitry
    Jun 18, 2014 at 19:25
  • Yes, different brains work different ways. I often copy something and want to paste multiple instances of it.  Going back to the source and copying it again would be possible but tedious.  Does this software support my use case?
    – Scott - Слава Україні
    Mar 1, 2017 at 21:00
  • @Scott No, I considered it but couldn't resolve how to do it easily (just involving keyboard shortcuts).
    – djromero
    Mar 2, 2017 at 11:50
  • Looks great - but website doesn't exist and other sites only offer Trial version. Good for 15 days if you're not on the US app store
    – Bysander
    Jun 6, 2018 at 16:50
4

Alfred's Powerpack let's you view your clipboard history for up to three months! It's not free but well worth it as it is a launcher (among other things) which is actively under development.

Improve this answer
3

Paste:clipboard history manager for your Mac

enter image description here

Improve this answer
1
  • Best GUI clipboard manager by far, and the only modern option offered here (for 2016).
    – erquhart
    Oct 6, 2016 at 18:35
2

PTHPasteboard

Supports at least 2,000 items in the history. (I've tried even more, though it does start to slow down at some point; a function of both the maximum number and the maximum size per entry, I expect.)

This is extremely handy when you're constantly jumping between a whole bunch of different systems, and those shorter histories (in other apps) just keep rotating around and losing stuff.

BTW: Another feature is that you can select to promote an item up to the top of the history, when pasting that item - keep important stuff from dropping off the bottom.

And it supports multiple pastebuffers, processing of text (such as pasting unformatted, or all upper / lower case), searching the history, etc. - lots of features.

Improve this answer
1
1

BetterTouchTool (a paid tool with a free trial) now has an integrated clipboard manager / clipboard history viewer:

https://docs.folivora.ai/docs/8_clipboardmanager.html

This is a nice option if you're already using BetterTouchTool for other things, since it saves you from installing (yet?) another utility program. In addition to clipboard history, I'm currently using BetterTouchTool to:

  • Map buttons 4 and 5 on my mouse (the thumb buttons) to browser forward/back
  • Display the currently-playing iTunes track on my Mac's touch bar.
Improve this answer
0

There is also a free one that allow me to view window from which I can drag and drop items from one long list. It's copypaste pro. Alfred also should do it.

Improve this answer
1
0

Once you use copyq, which works on Mac, Linux and Windows you will never use anything else ... especially after you configure a global shortcut to show it ...

Improve this answer

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged or ask your own question.