MacPipAnswer
How do I stop a screen recording on a Mac?
Click the Stop button (a small square in a circle) in the menu bar, or press Command-Control-Esc. That stops a recording made with Shift-Command-5 or QuickTime Player.
The video is saved as “Screen Recording [date] at [time].mov” on your desktop, or wherever you picked under Options → Save to. If you recorded with QuickTime Player, it opens the video for you.
Stop Apple’s recorder
- Move the pointer to the top of the screen if the menu bar is hidden (in a full-screen app, for example).
- Click the Stop button in the menu bar, or press Command-Control-Esc.
- Wait a moment for the thumbnail in the bottom-right corner. Click it to trim or share, or let it slide away and the file is saved.
- Find the file on the desktop, or in the place you chose under Options → Save to.
If the recording won’t stop or the file is missing
- No Stop button? Some menu bar tools hide icons. Use Command-Control-Esc instead.
- Can’t find the file? Look in the Save to place under Options. It could be Documents, or the video opened in Preview or QuickTime Player.
- Mac froze while recording? A recording that never stopped may be lost. Keep long recordings short, and leave free disk space: see how big a screen recording is.
Stop a Clacky recording
Clacky’s Screen Recorder (macOS 15 or later) gives you three places to stop: the Stop button on the small recording pill, Stop in the notch at the top of the screen (Clacky draws one on screens without it), and Stop Recording · 0:42 in Clacky’s menu-bar menu, with the time so far. The pill also has a trash button to throw the take away.
When you stop, a preview slides in at the bottom right: rename it, Make a Clip, Share, Copy, Show in Finder, Save As… or Move to Trash. The file is already in Movies › Clacky.
Where these facts come from
Checked on 5 November 2026.
- Apple: How to record the screen on Mac (Stop button, Command-Control-Esc, file name, QuickTime opens the recording)
- Apple: Take screenshots or screen recordings on Mac (Options, Save to)
Questions
What is the keyboard shortcut to stop a screen recording on a Mac?
Can I pause instead of stopping?
Where do Clacky recordings go?
Facts checked on 5 November 2026.
Related
- Pause a screen recording on a MacNot with the built-in tools: Shift-Command-5 and QuickTime only stop. Stop and join the clips, or use a recorder with Pause, like Clacky’s.
- Trim a screen recording on a MacOpen it in QuickTime Player, choose Edit → Trim, drag the yellow handles and click Trim. To cut a part from the middle, split the clip first.
- Where does Clacky save my screen recordings and screenshots?Recordings go to Movies › Clacky (~/Movies/Clacky) and screenshots to Pictures › Clacky Screenshots. You can change both folders. Nothing is uploaded.
- Stop from the notchWhile you record, the notch shows a red dot and the time, with Pause and Stop beside it. They never show up in the video.
- How big is a screen recording on a Mac? I measured itI saved four test recordings seven ways. A minute of typing was 2.5 MB, scrolling 49 MB, ProRes almost 1 GB. What decides the size, and how to shrink it.
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