Paste It! vs Maccy: Which Free Mac Clipboard Manager?
You already know the pitch for a free Mac clipboard manager: keep what you copy, search it later, stay local. Maccy is usually the first name people hear. Then you hit a wall — a screenshot you cannot search, a form that needs five clips in order, or an AI agent that cannot see your history — and someone mentions Paste It! as a Maccy alternative.
This is the head-to-head: Paste It! vs Maccy, not another “best of” table with five other apps. For the wider free shortlist, see best free clipboard managers for Mac.
Disclosure: we make Paste It!, a free and open-source clipboard manager. We still recommend Maccy for a lot of people. Where Paste It! is weaker, we say so.
Updated July 2026.
Quick verdict
- Stay on Maccy if you mostly copy text and links, want the smallest battle-tested free app, and do not care about OCR or multi-paste stacks.
- Try Paste It! if you copy screenshots or images, need a clipboard manager with OCR on Mac, use Pinboards / Paste Stack, or want read-only clipboard history for Claude, Cursor, or Codex via MCP.
- Both are free, open source, local-first, no account required for core history, and neither replaces a paid sync app if you need iPhone ↔ Mac iCloud history — that decision is Paste It! vs Paste.
Paste It! vs Maccy at a glance
| Paste It! | Maccy | |
|---|---|---|
| Price / license | Free, open source | Free, open source (MIT) |
| Search | Yes | Yes (fuzzy) |
| Images / previews | Yes (visual history) | Limited |
| OCR search | Yes (Apple Vision) | No |
| Pins / boards | Pinboards | Pins / favorites |
| Multi-paste / stack | Paste Stack | No |
| MCP history | Built-in read-only history MCP | No built-in history MCP |
| Local-only / no cloud | Yes (by design) | Yes |
| Maturity / track record | Newer project | Long-running default for many Mac users |
| macOS floor | macOS 14+ | Check Maccy’s current minimum |
| Best for | Images, OCR, stacks, agent context | Fast, minimal text history |
Feature rows can drift — verify on each project’s site or GitHub if a cell is load-bearing for you.
What they share
Paste It! and Maccy sit in the same honest category: free open source clipboard managers for Mac that keep local clipboard history without pushing you into a subscription for the basics.
Both:
- Record copies and let you pull older clips back with search
- Stay on your Mac (no Paste It! / Maccy account required for core history)
- Respect sensitive workflows better than a naive always-on logger (ignore lists / concealed password-manager content — check each app’s defaults)
- Do not give you polished iCloud sync to iPhone
If cross-device sync is the real requirement, neither app is pretending to be Paste-for-iCloud. See Paste It! vs Paste for that fork rather than hard-selling against sync users here.
Maccy — still the default for text-first Mac users
Verdict: if “free clipboard history” means fuzzy-searchable text and links with almost no ceremony, Maccy remains the safer default recommendation.
Maccy is a native, open-source clipboard manager. It records what you copy, opens with a shortcut, fuzzy-searches history, supports pins, and gets out of the way. Homebrew users often install it in one line; everyone else grabs it from the site or GitHub releases. Years of “install and forget” reputation matter when you just want the boring reliable tool.
Trade-offs: image-heavy workflows and OCR are not why people install Maccy. If your important clip was only ever a screenshot — UI text, an error dialog, a slide — searching the words inside the picture is outside Maccy’s job description. That is not a dunk; it is the ceiling that sends people looking for a Maccy alternative.
Choose Maccy if your clipboard is mostly plain text and URLs, you value maturity over feature surface area, and you want the lightest dedicated app that still searches well.
Paste It! — when images, OCR, and workflows matter
Verdict: switch (or trial alongside Maccy) when history has to include pictures you can find later, or when multi-paste and agent access are part of the job.
Paste It! keeps an infinite local history of text, rich text, HTML, images, file URLs, and links. Open the floating panel with Shift + Command + V, browse visual cards, and search. OCR (Apple Vision) indexes text in images so a screenshot is not a dead end.
You also get Pinboards for clips you want to keep ready, and Paste Stack (Shift + Command + C) when you need to paste several items in order — web forms, admin panels, multi-field chores. Privacy controls include pause capture, ignore lists, and retention pruning. No account. No telemetry. Optional MCP exposes the same local history to Claude, Cursor, Codex, and other MCP clients as read-only search (including OCR) — details in Use Mac clipboard history as context via MCP.
Trade-offs: Paste It! is a newer open-source app. Maccy has the longer track record. Paste It! targets macOS 14+. It will not sync history to an iPhone. If all you ever copy is plain text and you want the smallest possible tool, staying on Maccy is still the rational call.
Choose Paste It! if you need a clipboard manager with OCR on Mac, care about image previews and pinboards, use Paste Stack, or want agents to look up local history without you pasting context by hand. See features or download for Mac.
Which should you pick? (by scenario)
Developer who mostly copies errors, URLs, and snippets.
Maccy. Fast text history is enough; skip the extra surface area unless screenshots of failing UI are a weekly habit.
Designer, PM, or support person living in screenshots.
Paste It!. Image history plus OCR search is the difference between “I know I copied that dialog” and actually finding it.
Anyone filling multi-field forms from a pile of clips.
Paste It! — Paste Stack exists for that workflow. Maccy users usually paste one clip at a time from search.
Privacy-sensitive, local-only, single Mac.
Either. Both are local-first free tools. Pick on features, not on a fake privacy gap between them.
Already on Claude, Cursor, or Codex and tired of pasting context.
Paste It! if you want built-in history MCP (read-only, OCR included). Maccy does not ship that bridge; a tiny “current clipboard only” MCP is a different product.
Moving from Maccy to Paste It! (without drama)
There is no magic “import my entire Maccy database” promise here. Treat it as a trial, not a one-way migration:
- Install Paste It! and let it capture alongside Maccy for a few days.
- Watch for shortcut overlap (especially paste-history hotkeys) and adjust one app.
- Keep Maccy until you confirm OCR, Pinboards, or Paste Stack actually earn a permanent slot.
- Uninstall Maccy only when you stop opening it — not on day one.
If after a week you only ever search plain text, Maccy was probably already the right tool.
FAQ
Is Paste It! a Maccy alternative?
Yes, for people who outgrew text-first history — especially images, OCR, Paste Stack, or MCP history. It is not a drop-in twin of Maccy’s minimal UI. For many text-only users, Maccy remains the better fit.
Does Maccy support OCR?
No. Maccy is not aimed at searching text inside screenshots. If OCR search is the reason you are comparing tools, that points at Paste It! (or another OCR-capable app), not at stretching Maccy.
Which is better for privacy?
Both keep clipboard history local and free without an account for core use. Prefer whichever ignore-list / pause-capture defaults match how you work, and never treat a clipboard manager as your password vault. Neither app is a substitute for a password manager.
Can I use both?
Yes, short-term. Running two clipboard managers forever usually means duplicate captures and fighting over shortcuts. Trial both, then keep one.
If screenshots, OCR, Paste Stack, or agent-readable history matter, download Paste It!. If you want the smallest battle-tested text history, install Maccy and move on. For the full free shortlist (Raycast, Flycut, and more), read best free clipboard managers for Mac. Feature deep-dive: Features.