How to record your screen on Windows 11, and when you need more

Windows 11 has two screen recorders built in. Snipping Tool records any rectangle you drag, the whole screen included: press Windows+Shift+R. Xbox Game Bar records the game or app you are in: press Windows+Alt+R. Use Snipping Tool for a quick clip of a page or a bug, and Game Bar for games. Clipchamp and PowerPoint can record too. All of them save the screen as it looked, so a demo that should look edited, with zooms on your clicks and captions, needs more. My name is Vince, and I make Focal, a screen recorder for Windows, which makes me about as impartial on this subject as a parent at a school play. So Focal waits its turn at the end, and the free ways go first.

How to record your screen with Xbox Game Bar

Game Bar is the gaming overlay built into Windows 11. Despite the name, it records apps as well as games, and it is the quickest start of the lot, since all it needs is a shortcut.

1. Make sure it is on. Open Settings with Windows+I, search for “xbox” and turn on Enable Xbox Game Bar.
2. For the computer’s sound, press Windows+G, open Settings in Game Bar, go to Capturing and choose All.
3. Open the game or app you want to record.
4. Press Windows+Alt+R. The screen flashes to show that recording has started.
5. Press Windows+Alt+M to turn your microphone on or off while you record.
6. Press Windows+Alt+R again to stop.

If you would rather click than remember shortcuts, press Windows+G and choose Widget menu, Capture, Start recording. The same widget has Record last (Windows+Alt+G), which saves the moments that just happened when background recording is on, and Settings > Gaming > Captures sets how much it keeps. It is the answer to the bug that only appears when you are not trying to record it, which in my experience is every bug. Focal has nothing like it.

Recordings go to the Captures folder inside Videos, as MP4 files named after the app with the date and time, and Game Bar’s Gallery lists them. Microsoft’s Game Bar capture page has the rest of the details.

What Game Bar will and will not record

Microsoft describes Game Bar as capture for apps and games, with these limits:

• It works on one monitor at a time.
• Some games switch recording off, and their clips come out blank. Protected video cannot be recorded either.
• Recording clips needs a video card with one of the hardware video encoders Microsoft lists, from Intel, NVIDIA or AMD. Screenshots should work on any PC.
• When a window will not record, Microsoft’s own advice is to try Snipping Tool instead.
• Microsoft gives no maximum length for a recording, so I will not guess one.

How to record your screen with Snipping Tool

Snipping Tool is the screenshot app in Windows 11, which undersells it. Its Record mode is the closest thing Windows has to a general screen recorder: a rectangle of any part of the screen, up to all of it.

1. Press Windows+Shift+R. Or open Snipping Tool, select Record, then New.
2. Drag a rectangle over what you want to record. For the whole desktop, drag it from one corner of the screen to the other.
3. Check the sound. Since version 11.2307.44.0, released in 2023, Snipping Tool can record your PC’s audio and your microphone, both optional. Its settings hold the defaults, and with several microphones you pick one before you start.
4. Select Start.
5. Select Stop when you are done.

Then save it as it is, or choose Edit in Clipchamp to trim it, change its volume or add captions with Transcribe media. Microsoft’s Windows 11 guide says recordings save to your Videos folder by default. The recorder is Windows 11 only: Microsoft’s Snipping Tool instructions for Windows 10 have no video section.

Other ways to record that come from Microsoft

Two more recorders come with Microsoft apps you may already use, one in a video editor and one in a presentation app.

Recording in Clipchamp

Clipchamp, the video editor Snipping Tool opens, has its own recorder, and its free personal plan includes recording the screen, a webcam or both.

1. Open the record & create tab on the toolbar and choose screen, or screen & camera.
2. The first time, allow access to your camera and microphone.
3. Pick your microphone, then select the red button.
4. Choose a browser tab, a window or the entire screen, then select Share.
5. Select Stop sharing when you are done.

Two limits from Microsoft’s Clipchamp page: with a personal account, the computer’s sound records only when you share a browser tab with the audio sharing toggle on, and in the Clipchamp Windows app those tabs are Microsoft Edge tabs. A recording also has a maximum time, shown next to the elapsed time, so at least you can see the end coming. A WebM copy downloads to your computer, and the export button saves the edited video as an MP4.

Recording in PowerPoint

If what you record belongs in a presentation, PowerPoint records the screen straight onto a slide. It works in PowerPoint for Microsoft 365, 2024, 2021, 2019 and 2016.

1. Open the slide, then on the Insert tab select Screen Recording.
2. Choose Select Area, or press Windows+Shift+E, and drag over what you want. Windows+Shift+B selects the entire screen. The smallest area is 64 x 64 pixels.
3. Audio and the pointer record by default. Deselect Audio or Record Pointer to leave either out.
4. Select Record. Windows+Shift+D pauses and Windows+Shift+Q stops.

The video lands on the slide, which is exactly right if you are building a deck and a small surprise if you only wanted a file. Right-click it and choose Save Media as to keep a file, or Trim to shorten it.

What the built-in recorders leave out

For a quick clip of a bug or a setting, any of these is enough, and Snipping Tool is the one I would reach for. Nobody needs a cinematic zoom in a video called “the button does nothing”. The gaps show up when the video is for other people: a product demo, a tutorial, a launch video.

• They record what you aimed them at before you started. Game Bar records the app you are in, one monitor at a time. Snipping Tool and PowerPoint record the rectangle you drew.
• The cursor is part of the picture. Like most recorders, they save finished pixels, so the cursor stays the size Windows drew it and moves the way your hand did. PowerPoint’s Record Pointer switch is the only cursor control in Microsoft’s instructions. More on that in why Focal records without the cursor.
• Nothing zooms. Microsoft’s recording pages say nothing about zooming in on what you click, so text recorded on a large monitor stays small on a phone.
• Editing happens elsewhere, after the fact. Clipchamp is a real editor, with splitting, automatic captions and a tool that removes pauses, and a good one for free. It still starts from the same finished pixels.
• Sound needs care. Clipchamp records the computer’s sound only from a browser tab, and Game Bar needs Capturing set to All to include every computer sound. Your voice and the computer’s sound together, in sync, has its own guide: recording system audio and your microphone on Windows.

I go through the differences in more detail in Focal vs the recorders built into Windows.

When you need more: recording with Focal

I built Focal because the recorder I wanted for demo videos did not exist on Windows. It records the screen without the cursor in it and logs the cursor, clicks and keys as data, so the editor can make zooms, smooth the cursor and place captions after you stop. Building your own recorder is the long way to get one, and I can vouch for the long part. The short way is seven steps.

1. Download the 9 MB installer from the download page and run it. It installs in about a second, with no administrator prompt. The installer is not code-signed yet, so Windows may show “Windows protected your PC”: choose More info, then Run anyway. Focal then sits in the system tray.
2. Press Print Screen. If another program already owns that key, Focal uses Ctrl+PrtSc and tells you, and you can set your own shortcut in Settings.
3. Choose what to record: drag a region, click a window to snap to it, or press Enter for the whole screen. A region can stretch across two monitors and records as one video.
4. A small panel sets the microphone, system audio, camera and keystrokes before each recording. Your choices are kept for next time, except Everything for keystrokes.
5. After a countdown, a small control bar shows the time with pause and stop. Ctrl+Alt+M marks a moment, and markers become chapters.
6. Stop. The editor opens with zooms already made from your clicks and typing, easing in and out like a camera on a spring. Change what starts a zoom in the Zoom tab, or press Z to add one yourself.
7. Export an MP4 up to 4K at 60 fps, or a GIF, with presets for YouTube, Shorts and Reels.

What that adds over the built-in recorders

• Zooms that follow your clicks, which you can reshape, move or delete.
• A cursor that glides instead of jittering, with a ripple on each click, at any size and sharp at any zoom, because it is drawn after recording rather than baked in.
• Captions made on your computer by a speech model that runs there, in 26 languages, and editing by the transcript: select words to cut them, or cut every “um” and “uh” in one click. My own count was humbling.
• Microphone and system audio mixed into one track, with voice cleanup that removes background noise. Focal measures your microphone’s delay and corrects it, so your voice lines up with the picture.
• Recording on your GPU’s video encoder: an hour at 4K 60 fps used 4.8% of the CPU, measured on 2026-10-31 on an RTX 3090 with a Ryzen 9 9950X3D. Other machines differ.

For a demo from first take to export, see how to record a product demo video on Windows.

What Focal does not do

Focal runs on Windows 10 (21H2 or later) and Windows 11 only, with no Mac, Linux or phone version. It has no cloud and no share links, and it does not put a recording on a slide the way PowerPoint does. Recordings, edits and captions stay on your computer.

What Focal costs

Focal is free to record and edit, with every feature, no time limit, no card and no account. Exporting needs a license, and until you enter a key the editor’s preview shows a “Made with Focal” watermark. A license is $99 once, for one person on up to 3 computers, with no subscription, so there is nothing to remember to cancel.

The options side by side

Checked on 2026-11-02 against Microsoft’s support pages.

If the video is only for you, Snipping Tool is already on your PC, and it does the job well. If it is for an audience, try Focal on the next one and see whether the preview looks like someone spent an evening editing it.