Clipboard manager
SnipVault vs Maccy for Mac
Weighing up the Maccy app for Mac? Here is how it compares with SnipVault, feature by feature. Maccy is the free, open-source, keyboard-first clipboard manager. It does one job well and deliberately skips collections, snippets, OCR, and sync.
Prices and features verified 2026-09-04. Corrections: diljit@dprsoftwarelabs.com.
Maccy pricing
Free (open source)
MIT licensed via GitHub or Homebrew; $9.99 on the Mac App Store as a convenience. No sync, no iOS app.
sourceSnipVault pricing
$29.99/yr or $79 once
Also $2.49/month. 7-day free trial, no card.
Platforms
Maccy: Mac (macOS 14+)
SnipVault: macOS 13+, Apple Silicon and Intel
Feature by feature
What you get with each
| Feature | SnipVault | Maccy |
|---|---|---|
Clipboard history | ✓ | ✓ |
Unlimited history Maccy's UI caps at 999 items. | ✓ | Partial |
Full-text search | ✓ | ✓ |
Pinboards / collections + tags Maccy has pinning only. | ✓ | — |
Paste stack (sequential paste) | ✓ | — |
Screenshot OCR (region → text) Maccy 2.7 can copy text from an image preview; no screen capture. | ✓ | Partial |
OCR captures kept searchable (text + image) | ✓ | — |
Snippets with :keyword expansion | ✓ | — |
OTP / card-number auto-expiry | ✓ | — |
Ignores password managers | ✓ | ✓ |
Built-in emoji library | ✓ | — |
Works fully offline, on-device | ✓ | ✓ |
Sync between Macs SnipVault: iCloud sync in the iCloud-entitled build; secrets stay device-local. | Partial | — |
One-time purchase available | ✓ | ✓ |
Free tier / open source SnipVault: 7-day free trial, no card required. | — | ✓ |
| Price | $29.99/yr or $79 once | Free (open source) |
Strengths
Where Maccy is strong, and where SnipVault is
Maccy does well
- •Free and open source with 21k GitHub stars
- •Fast keyboard-first popup with search and ⌥P pinning
- •Ignores concealed content and 1Password by default
- •Shortcuts actions
SnipVault does well
- •Pinboards, tags, and a paste stack for organising clips
- •Screenshot OCR captures kept with their image
- •Snippets with :keyword expansion
- •Lazy loading and SQLite full-text search that stays fast past 999 items
What users say
Common complaints about Maccy
Quoted from public reviews and forums. Follow the links for full context.
“Memory usage can occasionally exceed 1GB… saved shortcuts removed… Moving on to alternatives.”
“Pretty poor visuals when copy pasting images, rich text.”
“Maccy doesn't do iCloud sync.”
Verdict
Which one should you pick?
Pick Maccy if…
- •You want a free, minimal, open-source history and nothing else
- •You never need to organise, tag, or OCR anything
Pick SnipVault if…
- •You have outgrown a flat list and want pinboards, tags, and search filters
- •You want screenshot OCR and snippets in the same palette
- •You want copied images and GIFs handled well, not as an afterthought
FAQ
SnipVault vs Maccy: questions
Why pay for SnipVault when Maccy is free?+
Maccy is a great free history. SnipVault adds pinboards, tags, a paste stack, screenshot OCR with a searchable capture library, snippet expansion, secret auto-expiry, and sync. If you only need the last few hundred text clips, Maccy is enough.
Is SnipVault keyboard-first like Maccy?+
Yes. ⇧⌘V opens the palette, type to search, ↑↓ to pick, ⏎ to paste, ⌘1–9 for recent items, ⌥⏎ to copy only.
How much does Maccy cost?+
Maccy is Free (open source). MIT licensed via GitHub or Homebrew; $9.99 on the Mac App Store as a convenience. No sync, no iOS app. SnipVault is $2.49 a month, $29.99 a year, or $79 once, and every plan has every feature.
What platforms does Maccy run on?+
Maccy: Mac (macOS 14+). SnipVault runs on macOS 13 or later, on Apple Silicon and Intel Macs, and one licence covers up to three Macs.
Can I try SnipVault before switching?+
Yes. SnipVault has a 7-day trial of the complete app with no card, and you can keep Maccy running alongside it until you are sure.
Try SnipVault next to Maccy
Keep both installed for a week. If SnipVault does not replace it, nothing was charged.