Best Clipboard Managers for Mac in 2026: An Honest Comparison

How we compared them

We looked at what matters day to day: how fast you can find and paste an old clip, how clips are organized, what happens to sensitive data, whether it syncs, and what it costs. We make Clipboardly, so we've tried to be fair about where other apps are the better choice.

Quick comparison

1. Clipboardly: best for keeping clips organized by project

Clipboardly is a Mac-only clipboard manager built around boards. Create a board for what you're working on, such as a product launch or a client, and make it active. Everything you copy is saved into that board until you switch.

• Quick Paste: press ⌘⇧V in any app, type a few letters and press Return.
• Menu bar panel with search and filters.
• 12 automatic clip types, including links, code, colors, emails, phone numbers, addresses, API keys and passwords.
• Privacy: pinned and PIN-locked clips, and one-click Pause.
• Extras: iCloud Sync through your own account, and auto-capture of screenshots.

Consider something else if you need your clipboard on iPhone or Windows. Clipboardly is Mac only.

2. Maccy: best free clipboard manager

Maccy is free, open source (MIT) and deliberately simple: a keyboard-first list of your history with search and pins, plus the option to ignore sensitive apps. It's the default recommendation for “free clipboard manager for Mac” for good reason.

Consider something else if you want boards, previews of images and links, locked clips or sync. Maccy doesn't sync. See Clipboardly vs Maccy.

3. Paste: best across Mac, iPhone and iPad

Paste is the best-known premium clipboard manager. It syncs through iCloud across Mac, iPhone and iPad, organizes clips into pinboards and can search text inside images. It's sold as a subscription ($3.99/month or $29.99/year), with a lifetime option on the App Store.

Consider something else if you only use a Mac or would rather avoid a subscription. See Clipboardly vs Paste.

4. Raycast: best if you already live in a launcher

Raycast is a launcher with clipboard history as one of many features, alongside extensions, snippets, window management and AI. At the time of writing, its free plan keeps clipboard history for 3 months; longer history and sync are part of Pro.

Consider something else if you only want a clipboard manager and not a whole launcher. See Raycast clipboard history alternatives.

5. ClipBook: best one-time purchase for local-only history

ClipBook offers unlimited local history, tags and a long list of text transformations for a one-time price per device. It's a solid pick if you want everything to stay on one Mac and prefer paying once.

6. Alfred: best for existing Alfred users

Alfred's clipboard history comes with the paid Powerpack, together with workflows and snippets. If you already use Alfred, its clipboard history may be all you need.

7. macOS Tahoe Spotlight: fine for occasional use

macOS Tahoe added clipboard history to Spotlight (⌘Space then ⌘4). It keeps items for 30 minutes, 8 hours or 7 days, has no pinning, and doesn't sync to other devices. It's a good start if you rarely need old clips. Read macOS Tahoe clipboard history: how it works and its limits.

How to choose

• You want free and simple: Maccy, or see our list of the 6 best free clipboard managers for Mac.
• You need your clipboard on iPhone and iPad: Paste.
• You want a launcher that does everything: Raycast or Alfred.
• You work on several projects and want clips sorted automatically: Clipboardly.
• You rarely need anything older than today: macOS Tahoe's built-in history.

Frequently asked questions