OpenScreen

Overview

Open-source screen recording app for creating beautiful product demos and walkthroughs. A free alternative to Screen Studio — no watermarks, no subscriptions, MIT licensed for personal and commercial use.

Repository: siddharthvaddem/openscreen

OpenScreen captures your screen and applies post-processing effects (zoom, cursor highlighting, backgrounds, motion blur) to produce polished demo videos — the kind you'd normally need Screen Studio ($29/month) or a video editor to create.

Key Differentiators

• Free forever — MIT license, no usage limits, no watermarks
• Post-processing effects — automatic/manual zooms, motion blur, custom backgrounds
• Cross-platform — macOS, Windows, Linux
• Built with Electron — React + TypeScript + PixiJS for rendering

Instructions

Installation

macOS

Download from GitHub Releases.

If macOS Gatekeeper blocks the app:

# Remove quarantine attribute
xattr -rd com.apple.quarantine /Applications/Openscreen.app

Then grant permissions in System Settings → Privacy & Security for:

• Screen Recording
• Accessibility

Linux

# Download the AppImage
chmod +x Openscreen-Linux-*.AppImage
./Openscreen-Linux-*.AppImage

# If sandbox error occurs:
./Openscreen-Linux-*.AppImage --no-sandbox

Requires PipeWire for system audio capture (default on Ubuntu 22.04+, Fedora 34+).

Windows

Download and run the installer from GitHub Releases. System audio works out of the box.

Core Features

Screen Capture

• Full screen or specific window recording
• Microphone audio and system audio capture simultaneously
• Region cropping to hide unwanted areas

Zoom Effects

• Automatic zooms — follows cursor clicks and interactions
• Manual zooms — place zooms at specific timestamps
• Customizable depth — control how far each zoom goes
• Duration & position — fine-tune timing and focal point

Post-Processing

• Motion blur — smoother pan and zoom transitions
• Background options — wallpapers, solid colors, gradients, or custom images
• Annotations — add text, arrows, and images on top of recordings
• Speed control — vary playback speed at different segments
• Trimming — cut out unwanted sections

Export

• Multiple aspect ratios — 16:9, 9:16 (vertical), 1:1 (square)
• Multiple resolutions — from 720p to 4K
• Optimized compression for web or social media

Examples

Example 1: Recording a Product Demo

User request: "Record a polished product demo for our landing page."

Steps:

1. Close unnecessary apps and notifications
2. Set display to 1920×1080, open the app to demo
3. Launch OpenScreen, select capture source (full screen or window)
4. Enable microphone for narration, choose gradient background
5. Record — walk through the demo naturally, clicking and interacting
6. Review auto-generated zoom keyframes, adjust depth and timing
7. Add manual zooms for key moments, set motion blur intensity
8. Trim dead time, export at 16:9 1080p for web

Example 2: Creating Social Media Content

User request: "Create a short vertical video showing our new feature."

Steps:

1. Set up recording focused on the specific feature area
2. Record a concise walkthrough (30-60 seconds)
3. In post-processing, add text annotations highlighting key moments
4. Set aspect ratio to 9:16 (vertical) for Instagram/TikTok
5. Increase speed on setup steps, slow down on the key interaction
6. Export with optimized compression for social media

Guidelines

• Use a clean desktop — hide dock/taskbar icons you don't need
• Increase cursor size — makes zooms look cleaner
• Move deliberately — slow, purposeful mouse movements record better
• Use gradient backgrounds — they look professional with minimal effort
• Record at 60fps — smoother playback, especially with zoom effects
• Export twice — once for web (compressed, 1080p) and once for presentations (higher quality)
• Beta software — expect occasional bugs; no webcam overlay yet
• No CLI currently — GUI-only application