Install

PwrSnap ships two builds: a universal macOS app (Apple silicon and Intel in one download) and a signed Windows x64 installer. Both are code-signed, both update themselves, and both come from the same GitHub releases page.

Pick your platform

macOS

Homebrew

The fastest path if you already run Homebrew:

brew install --cask pwrdrvr/tap/pwrsnap

That pulls from pwrdrvr/homebrew-tap — PwrDrvr’s own tap, not homebrew/cask. The main cask repository requires a project to clear a notability bar (a GitHub star count PwrSnap hasn’t reached yet), so PwrDrvr publishes the cask itself. The formula points at the same signed, notarized DMG you’d download by hand.

Upgrading and removing work the way you’d expect:

brew upgrade --cask pwrsnap

brew uninstall --cask pwrsnap

Add --zap to the uninstall to also clear PwrSnap’s application support, caches, logs, and preferences. --zap never touches ~/Documents/PwrSnap — the cask deliberately leaves your captures alone, so uninstalling the app can’t delete screenshots.

The cask is marked auto_updates, so Homebrew won’t nag you about a version PwrSnap has already updated itself past. brew upgrade still works whenever you want to drive it from the command line.

Direct download

Grab the DMG straight from the latest release:

https://github.com/pwrdrvr/PwrSnap/releases/latest/download/PwrSnap.dmg

That URL always resolves to the current Stable release. It’s a universal binary — one download for both Apple silicon and Intel — and it’s Developer ID-signed and notarized, so it opens on a double-click with no right-click-to-open dance and no Gatekeeper warning.

Open the DMG, drag PwrSnap to Applications, eject, launch.

Verify the signature

Optional, and only worth doing if you care to check:

codesign -dv --verbose=2 /Applications/PwrSnap.app

Look for Authority=Developer ID Application: PwrDrvr LLC. To confirm Gatekeeper is satisfied with the notarization too:

spctl -a -vv /Applications/PwrSnap.app

First launch

Three things happen the first time you run PwrSnap:

• The tray icon appears in the menu bar. PwrSnap is a menu-bar-first app — the Library window is something you open when you want it, not something that sits in your way.
• macOS asks for Screen Recording the first time you capture. PwrSnap asks when you first need it rather than throwing a wall of prompts at install; see Capture → Permissions for what each permission is for and how to recover from a denial.
• macOS asks for your Documents folder, because captures live in ~/Documents/PwrSnap/ where Finder can see them. The prompt fires cleanly before the capture UI covers the screen, and the usage string spells out that PwrSnap only reads and writes its own folder.

Then press Command+Shift+C and drag a region. That’s the whole daily-driver flow — see Capture.

Windows

Download and install

Windows builds are published on each release as PwrSnap-<version>-windows-x64-setup.exe — the version is baked into the filename, so grab the newest one from the releases page. Every release also carries a PwrSnap-windows-SHA256SUMS file if you want to check the download against its published hash.

The installer has been signed since v1.0.1 (Azure Artifact Signing), so SmartScreen lets it through without the unknown-publisher warning. It installs per-user into %LOCALAPPDATA%\Programs\PwrSnap — no administrator rights needed — and you can point it somewhere else during setup if you’d rather.

To confirm the signature yourself:

signtool verify /pa /v PwrSnap-1.0.3-windows-x64-setup.exe

The subject should read CN=PwrDrvr LLC.

First launch

• The tray icon sits in the notification area, next to the taskbar clock. Click it for the capture popover; right-click for the short menu.
• The default capture shortcut is Ctrl+Shift+C. Every PwrSnap shortcut is stored with a portable modifier, so what’s Command on macOS is Ctrl on Windows: video recording is Ctrl+Alt+C and re-showing the last float-over is Ctrl+Alt+Shift+F.
• .pwrsnap files open in PwrSnap — the installer registers the file association with Explorer, so double-clicking a capture opens it in the editor.

What’s different on Windows

Honest differences, not asterisks:

• Recordings have no audio. The microphone and system-audio paths are macOS-only today; on Windows the audio toggles are ignored and clips are saved screen-only.
• No Quick Look previews. The Finder thumbnail and Spacebar preview extensions are macOS app extensions, so Explorer shows a generic icon for .pwrsnap files.
• Recording runs through a bundled FFmpeg rather than the macOS system recorder. Same output, different engine.
• The menu bar is drawn in-app, since PwrSnap uses a custom title bar.
• Shortcut glyphs still render as ⌘ / ⌥ / ⇧ in a few places in the UI instead of Ctrl / Alt / Shift. The shortcuts themselves are correct — only the labels are wrong. It’s a known polish gap.
• Logs live at %APPDATA%\PwrSnap\logs\main.log.

Everything else is there: the tray, the region selector, the window picker, the float-over toast, the Library and editor, video recording, and the full AI surface — Codex discovery works on Windows and no AI feature is gated by platform.

Linux

Not yet. Linux builds run as a CI gate so the code keeps compiling, but nothing is packaged for download and there’s no date attached. Wayland/X11 capture, tray behavior, and global shortcuts have had no real pass.

Updates

PwrSnap updates itself. Two independent choices in Settings → General decide what it updates to:

Most people want Stable + Latest and never touch this page.

PwrSnap checks hourly, plus once shortly after launch. When a new build has downloaded, a toast appears in the lower-left corner (out of the way of the float-over, which lives in the lower-right):

• Update ready → Restart to install it.
• Update retry needed → the install didn’t finish. Retry update re-downloads and restarts. No dead ends.

Dismissing a toast silences that exact version; a genuinely new one shows up again.

Switching back down. If you try Beta and want to return to Stable, pick Stable and then hit Check for Updates — moving to a lower version number is only offered on a check you asked for, never on a background poll. The wording changes to Switch ready / Restart to Switch rather than “update”, because the version number is going down. A build that downloaded for a channel you’ve since left is held, not installed.

Homebrew users: brew upgrade --cask pwrsnap works too. The cask tracks the Stable train only — beta testers use the in-app channel switch.

Uninstall

macOS — quit PwrSnap, then drag PwrSnap.app from Applications to the Trash (or brew uninstall --cask pwrsnap).

Windows — Settings → Apps → Installed apps → PwrSnap → Uninstall.

What stays behind, deliberately:

• Your captures. Every .pwrsnap bundle in ~/Documents/PwrSnap/ (or ~/PwrSnap/) is an ordinary file and survives the uninstall. Delete the folder yourself if you actually want them gone.
• The index and settings, in ~/Library/Application Support/PwrSnap/ on macOS or %APPDATA%\PwrSnap\ on Windows. Removing this folder resets PwrSnap to a fresh install — your captures stay on disk but the searchable index of them doesn’t. On macOS, brew uninstall --cask --zap pwrsnap clears it for you.

Troubleshooting

The first capture comes out gray or empty. macOS hasn’t granted Screen Recording yet. Open Settings → System Permissions and use Request access on the Screen Recording row — that fires the real OS prompt.

A permission row says “Not yet requested”. That’s not a denial. PwrSnap distinguishes never asked from asked and refused, so you don’t get pointed at System Settings for a question nobody put to you. Hit Request access and answer the prompt.

Documents access was denied. PwrSnap falls back to ~/PwrSnap/ and keeps working. To move back once you’ve granted access, use Settings → System Permissions → Captures folder → Check access, which offers to move captures back to Documents.

Update checks say they’re rate-limited. The update feed is GitHub’s anonymous API, which allows 60 requests an hour per IP. If several apps on your network share that budget, PwrSnap backs off for 15 minutes and says so plainly rather than pretending the release feed is down. Wait it out, or hit Check for Updates again later.

Recordings on Windows are silent. Expected — see what’s different on Windows.

Where the logs are. Help ▸ Logs in the app menu opens them. On disk: ~/Library/Logs/PwrSnap/main.log on macOS, %APPDATA%\PwrSnap\logs\main.log on Windows.