1 TechSmith Camtasia Studio

Techsmith’s Camtasia Studio is an all in one screen recording and editing suite.

Camtasia Studio can be used by hobbyists and professionals alike. Its capabilities include recording the screen, recording the webcam, editing video, editing audio, adding transitions and animated callouts.

It also features comprehensive editing features. You can cut, join and render the video based on various options.

Camtasia Studio costs $200.

Pros

• Powerful screen capture capabilities
• Professional editing features including green screen, callouts, and transitions
• Built in extensive media library
• Export to MP4, WMV, MOV, AVI, M4V, and GIF
• Export project files to continue editing elsewhere or share with other people
• Various mouse effects (sounds, clicks) to make the video look realistic
• Multi layer editing with timeline capabilities

Cons

• Expensive compared to other software
• In the free version, videos are watermarked

2 Atomi Active Presenter 6 – Full-Scale Screen Recording and Tutorial Creation

Atomi Active presenter 6 is a strong contender in the screen capture and recording space.

The software is designed mainly for e-learning and course creation, but with its features, anyone can use it for screen recording and similar purposes.

Similar to other software listed here, Active Presenter is also based on a freemium model. Its free version has most of the necessary features for basic screen recording.

It’s editing capabilities are a powerhouse. No other software mentioned here comes close.

Even in the free version of Active Presenter 6, you can:

• Record videos of unlimited length
• Edit videos with cut, speed up/down, blur, volume adjustment
• Edit with multiple layers (only software that allows this in free version)
• Full annotation capabilities
• Export to MP4, FLV, WebM, AVI, WMV and MKV formats

Active Presenter 6 pricing starts at 0 (free) and goes upto $299 for the professional edition. You can compare the different versions and buy Active Presenter on their website.

Pros

• You can create interactive videos, quizzes and include interactivity with various branching logic with Event based actions and Javascript (Professional edition)
• Export Videos to HTML5 (Professional Edition)
• Full Learning Management System Capabilities (LMS) with tracking (Professional edition)
• Export to PowerPoint, Word, Excel, Adobe PDF, and HTML (Standard Edition Onward)
• No limits to recording time even in free version
• Full editing capabilities even in the free version
• Lossless video recording
• Record system audio and microphone simultaneously
• Customizable hotkeys for all capture features

Cons

• No commercial license for videos in the free version
• No direct online uploads to YouTube or other video hosting sites

3 Bandicam – Gaming and High Frame Rate Screen Recording

Bandicam is a great screen capture software for advanced users. It’s not designed for absolute beginners but with a little tweaking, everyone can use it.

Bandicam is designed to capture your screen, game recording, webcam and even an HDMI capture device. The initial interface can look scary to some people, but it’s well organized.

Apart from screen recording, you can also record audio. Screen annotation options are available as well which is great for video tutorials.

Advanced users can also customize the encoder and the frame rate with which you want to record and save the clip. Bandicam supports a maximum capture framerate of 144fps, which is amazing.

Bandicam license starts at $39 for a single PC. You can purchase the license here.

Pros

• Encoding and framerate control
• Max frame rate of 144fps
• Screen annotation supported
• Upto 4K UHD resolution supported
• Capture IPTV, Smartphones, and Game Consoles
• Watermarking and webcam overlay support
• Mouse effects supported

Cons

• No editing capabilities (you have to download a different utility for that)
• Only MP4 and AVI formats are supported for export
• Free version supported video of 10 minutes only

4 Ice Cream Screen Recorder – Feature Rich Screen Capture Software

Ice Cream Screen Recorder is a feature-rich screen recorder that lets you capture video and screenshots.

Ice Cream Screen Recorder has a decent feature list. You can record your screen, system audio, and microphone. You can also overlay your webcam on the screen while recording it.

Apart from that, you can also draw on the screen while recording. This is very useful for creating tutorial videos. You can draw different shapes, arrows or even erase a created shape.

The Pro Edition for Ice Cream Screen Recorder is only $29.95 for two computers. You can purchase the license here.

Pros

• Decent features even in free version
• Records in 25 fps
• Multiple annotation options
• Available for both Windows and Mac
• Watermarking and webcam overlay supported
• Follow mouse feature allows you to capture a small resolution video on a large display
• Hotkey overlay supported. Shows the key combination you press in the actual video

Cons

• Exports only to WebM format or YouTube in free version
• No editing capabilities
• No commercial use of videos in free version

5 iSpring Free Cam – Free Unlimited Screen Capture with Editing

iSpring Free Cam is a completely free screen recorder with no limits. It has a simple user interface and very little settings to fiddle around.

Once you click the record button, a frame is drawn around the screen which denotes the area that will be recorded. You can easily resize this frame or enter your custom dimensions for recording.

You can use the F9 key to start and pause the recording and the Esc key to end the recording. To discard the recording, you can press F10. These keys are customizable as well.

iSpring Free Cam also has powerful audio editing capabilities. You can reduce noise, fade music in or out and adjust volume as well.

Pros

• No limits on recording
• Decent audio editing capabilities
• Completely free software
• In built video editor with cut and join features
• Upload videos to YouTube directly
• Enhance, suppress or mute audio in parts of the video

Cons

• Export options limited to WMV and YouTube
• Recording frame rate is only 15 FPS

6 ScreenPresso – Simple Screen Capture Software

Screepresso is a simple screen capture software. After downloading the setup, you can install it or run it as portable software.

The interface is pretty straightforward. Press the capture button to capture an image or the screen directly. Screenpresso works in the background, and there are no toolbars on the screen.

Screenpresso Pro starts at 28.89 Euros per license. You can buy the Pro version on their website.

Pros

• No Limits to screen capture
• Multiple Export Options (required external software download)
• Built-in sharing options to ScreenPresso Cloud, Google Drive, Dropbox and Onedrive
• Free cloud storage on Screenpresso Cloud (no registration requested)
• Capture Android devices with Android Center (Android 4.4+ only)
• Can be run in portable mode
• Corporate deployment-ready software with policy options to disable certain features

Cons

• Windows only
• No annotations
• Captures are watermarked in free version

7 CamStudio – Free And Powerful Screen Capture

Camstudio is a completely free video recorder. It’s a tiny software with excellent capabilities for free software. CamStudio can record your screen and save the output in Flash (SWF), MP4 or AVI formats.

You have a choice of few codecs to encode your videos with. You can control the frame rate you want to record on. But the actual framerate will depend on the hardware you use.

You also have annotation capabilities, mouse highlight features, and audio recording. The performance is fast and does not use much system resources.

Pros

• Completely free
• No limits on recording
• Annotation and title capabilities
• Commercial license for all videos
• Lossless capture with CamStudio’s own codec
• Webcam overlay supported

Cons

• Not updated in years (last update 2013), still works great
• Ad-supported, prompts to install browser toolbars and antivirus upon install
• Video capture is not the sharpest

8 OBS Project – Open Source Broadcast and Desktop Capture

The OBS project (Open Broadcast Software) is a screen record and broadcast utility. It’s an open source software and supports Windows, Mac, and Linux.

Since OBS is open source, there are no free or premium versions to choose from. You get all the recording and broadcasting features without limits.

The interface is a little complex and hard to setup at first. We spent a few minutes to understand why we couldn’t record anything. We then figured that we had to add a source to record the video from. Recording began immediately after that.

Pros

• Open source software
• Completely Free
• No limits on recording
• No watermarks on vidoes
• Built in audio mixer to mix sound from multiple sources
• Video filtering with chroma key, image correction and image masking
• Supports Twitch, Hitbox, and YouTube Gaming for streaming

Cons

• The interface can be hard to understand
• You have to tweak settings to record in the best quality (OBS does have an auto setup for this in beta)
• Since this is a recording and broadcasting software, there are no advanced editing features like in other software

9 Apowersoft Screen Recorder Pro – Screen Recording With Powerful Export Options

Apowersoft screen recorder is a powerful and comprehensive screen recording and editing software.

The complete software package has two parts, the recording software, and the editing software. Even if you only install the recording software, the editing software can be installed directly from the recording software at the click of a button.

Apowersoft has all the features of a good recorder. You can capture regions, full screen, around the mouse or even dual monitors. You can also capture webcam and audio. The audio can be saved in MP3, AAC, OGG, WMA, WAC or FLAC formats.

Apowersoft has many other products which can be purchased as a bundle or individually. The license for pro version for professional use starts at $39.95 per year and can be purchased here.

Pros

• Comprehensive video recording features
• Video Output in MP3, WMV, AVI, MOV, FLV, MPEG, VOB, ASF and GIF formats
• Excellent editing options with free addon
• Webcam overlay supported
• Real-time annotations supported
• Scheduled recording
• Direct sharing to YouTube, FTP, and Showmore.com (10 GB free storage)

Cons

• Free version limited to 3-minutes recording and 1 minute rendering for the editor
• Free version outputs watermarked videos
• Free version has too many pop-ups asking for upgrade

10 Chris PC Screen Recorder – Record Your Screen At High Framerates

Chris PC Screen Recorder takes a minimal and simple approach to screen capture and recording. The interface is small and simple. You can record a specific region or fullscreen. The trade off is that it lacks some advanced features like webcam overlay, panning with the mouse and advanced audio capture.

The pro license costs $29.99 and can be purchased from their website.

Pros

• True framerate control. Recording frame rate is not cut down like other recorders
• Decent video editor to cut out sections and join them
• Hide the cursor while recording
• Video watermarking available
• Supports recording gameplay

Cons

• Doesn’t have advanced features which might be required for professional work
• Only captures upto 10 minutes with watermark (in free version)
• No annotations

11 Monavi Screen Capture Studio 8 – Limited Free Version Desktop Recorder

monavi Screen Capture Studio 8 is a feature-rich screen recorder. You can use it to record the screen or take screenshots.

The software has good recording features like webcam recording, audio recording etc. However, there are severe limitations in the free version. Due to these limitations, we would recommend that if you decide to use Monavi Screen Capture Studio, you should buy the full version.

The full version has excellent editing features like cutting and joining videos, applying filters, annotations, cropping and more.

The premium version for Monavi Screen Capture studio starts at $59.95 and can be purchased from their website.

Pros

• Moderate recording features
• Clean and flat UI
• True Frame Rate Capture
• Export to MP4, GIF, AVI, WMV
• Windows and Mac supported
• Video editing features with cutting, transitions, and overlay support
• Upload videos to YouTube directly
• Callouts, mouse, and keyboard action highlight is supported

Cons

• Only a seven day free trial
• Un-acceptable watermark in the free version (big red text in the middle of the video)
• 120 seconds limit in the free version