How to Record Gameplay on Mac With Game Sound

To record gameplay on a Mac, press Shift-Command-5, choose Record Entire Screen or Record Selected Portion, and click Record. Before macOS 27 that built-in recorder captures only the microphone, not the game’s sound, so most players use OBS Studio, which records app audio on macOS 13 and later, or a game recorder like GameClip.

Recording gameplay on a Mac is mostly an audio problem. The picture is easy: macOS has a screen recorder built in, and Apple silicon encodes video in hardware without slowing the game. Getting the game’s sound into the file, and keeping the files a sane size on a Retina display, is where the choices are.

What are the ways to record gameplay on a Mac?

Tool	Game sound	Microphone	Webcam	Separate audio tracks	Requires
Screenshot toolbar (Shift-Command-5)	macOS 27 or later (“Include System Audio”)	Yes	No	No	Built in
QuickTime Player (File > New Screen Recording)	Same as the toolbar	Yes	No	No	Built in
OBS Studio	Yes (macOS Screen Capture source)	Yes	Yes	Yes	macOS 13 or later for app audio
GameClip recorder	Yes, always	Optional	Yes, as an on-screen bubble	No (mixed)	macOS 15 or later

How do you record with the built-in Mac screen recorder?

1. Press Shift-Command-5 to open the Screenshot toolbar.
2. Choose Record Entire Screen or Record Selected Portion.
3. Open Options to pick the microphone and the save location. On macOS 27 or later, choose Include System Audio to record the game’s sound.
4. Click Record. Stop with the Stop button in the menu bar or Command-Control-Esc.

The files are .mov at the screen’s full Retina resolution, which on a MacBook Pro means files far larger than the 1080p you will publish. It works for a quick clip; for long sessions, the tools below give you more control.

How do you record Mac gameplay with OBS Studio?

OBS Studio is free and is the most flexible option on a Mac.

1. Install OBS and allow Screen & System Audio Recording in System Settings > Privacy & Security when asked.
2. Add a macOS Screen Capture source. Pick Display to record the whole screen or Window for just the game. On macOS 13 and later this source can capture the app’s audio too.
3. Add your mic and webcam. Add an audio input capture for the microphone and a Video Capture Device for the camera.
4. Split the audio tracks. In Advanced Audio Properties, put the game on track 1 and the mic on track 2, and enable both for recording.
5. Use the hardware encoder. In Settings > Output, choose Apple VT H264 Hardware Encoder (or HEVC). It runs on the media engine of Apple silicon.
6. Scale the output. Set the output resolution to 1920x1080 in Settings > Video so a Retina display doesn’t produce 5K files.

What settings should you use on a Mac?

Setting	Recommended	Why
Output resolution	1920x1080 (or 2560x1440)	Retina screens are 2x; full size wastes disk
Frame rate	60 fps if the game holds it, else 30	Record what the game actually renders
Encoder	Apple VideoToolbox (hardware)	Little cost to the game
Codec	HEVC for long sessions, H.264 for compatibility	HEVC files are about half the size
Format	MKV or fragmented MP4 in OBS	A crash leaves a playable file
Audio	48 kHz, game and mic on separate tracks	Easier to balance and caption

Mac games often run in a window or at a scaled resolution. Recording the window instead of the display keeps notifications and your Dock out of the clip.

How does the GameClip recorder work on a Mac?

GameClip is a desktop app for macOS and Windows that turns long gameplay recordings into a highlight video and vertical clips with captions, zooms and sound effects. On macOS 15 and later it also records:

1. Open the Recorder tab and pick a display (any of them on a two-monitor setup) or a single game window.
2. Choose the quality: Native (capped at 4K), 1440p, 1080p or 720p, at 30 or 60 fps, H.264 or HEVC. The game’s sound is always recorded; the microphone when you turn it on.
3. Press F9 to start, F10 to pause and resume, F11 to stop. The keys work while the game has focus.
4. When something good happens, press F8 to mark the last 30 seconds or F7 the last 2 minutes. Marks go straight to the analysis, which always checks those stretches first.
5. Turn on the webcam bubble if you want your face in the recording: a small always-on-top window that the capture keeps.

When you stop, a new session opens with the files and your marks filled in, ready to analyze. The limits: the recorder needs macOS 15 (on macOS 13 and 14 you can still import recordings from OBS or the toolbar), the microphone is mixed into the game audio rather than kept on its own track, and the Windows recorder isn’t out yet. You can download GameClip and try the recorder on your next session.

What do you do with the recording afterwards?

A long session is mostly walking, looting and menus. The plays worth posting are a few seconds each, scattered across hours. Finding the best moments in a long recording explains how to do it by hand or automatically, and how to make a gaming video covers the edit from there. If you also play on a Windows PC, how to record gameplay on PC lists the tools there.

FAQ

Why does my Mac screen recording have no game sound?

Before macOS 27, the built-in screen recorder only records a microphone, not the sound your Mac plays. Use OBS Studio’s macOS Screen Capture source (macOS 13 or later) or a recorder that captures system audio, or update to macOS 27 and choose Include System Audio.

What is the shortcut to record the screen on a Mac?

Shift-Command-5 opens the Screenshot toolbar with the recording options. Command-Control-Esc stops a recording in progress.

Does recording gameplay slow down a Mac?

Very little with a hardware encoder. Apple silicon Macs have a dedicated media engine for H.264 and HEVC, so recording at 1080p60 leaves the GPU to the game. Recording at full Retina resolution costs more disk space than performance.

Can I record gameplay on an older macOS version?

Yes. OBS Studio records the game’s sound on macOS 13 and later. The GameClip recorder needs macOS 15, but GameClip itself runs on macOS 13 and later and imports recordings from any tool.

Where does GameClip save Mac recordings?

In a dated folder inside your Movies folder by default; you can change the folder in the recorder’s settings. Each pause starts a new part file, and the session keeps them in order.