A Screenpipe alternative that's built for recall, not plumbing.

// the short version

Where Screenpipe has landed

Screenpipe earned its following as an open-source, cross-platform engine for 24/7 screen and mic capture — the raw material for a personal AI, with a plugin system to build on top.

It has since repositioned around AI agents: the pitch today is a local-first context layer you plug into agent frameworks and integrations. Along the way the license moved from MIT to a source-available commercial license, and the signed desktop app became a subscription starting at $25/month (personal, non-commercial use stays free).

None of that is wrong — it's just a different product than a personal memory. If what you wanted was the recall part — find that page, replay that meeting, ask what you worked on last week — you're assembling it yourself from parts. That's the gap Mnema fills.

// choosing a replacement

What to look for in an alternative

A tool that records everything you see and hear is a serious commitment. Four things worth insisting on.

• ✓
  Built for recall, not agent plumbing If what you want is to find that thing you saw last Tuesday, you want a polished timeline, search, and ask-AI out of the box — not an API you wire agents into first.
• ✓
  Actually open source Source-available licenses let you read the code but restrict what you can do with it. A genuinely open-source license means the community can fork, audit, and keep the project alive.
• ✓
  Predictable price A subscription for software that runs entirely on your own machine adds up forever. A one-time purchase means the copy you bought keeps working, whatever happens to the company.
• ✓
  Stays on your Mac Capture, text extraction, transcription, and search should all run on-device, with the record encrypted at rest. No account, no servers, no telemetry.

// the field

Mnema vs Screenpipe vs OpenRecall

All three keep your data local — the differences are in what you get out of the box, the license, and the price.

Competitor details reflect public information as of July 2026 — check each project directly before deciding.

// questions

Frequently asked

Is Screenpipe still open source?

Not in the usual sense. Screenpipe launched under the MIT license but later moved to a source-available commercial license: personal, non-commercial use stays free, but commercial use requires a paid license, and the signed desktop app is a subscription starting at $25/month. Mnema is open source, and the app is a one-time $69 purchase.

What is the best Screenpipe alternative for Mac?

If you want personal recall — a private, searchable record of what you've seen, heard, and done — Mnema is built exactly for that on the Mac: on-device capture, transcription with speaker labels, timeline scrubbing, search, and ask-AI, with the record encrypted at rest. If you mainly want raw screen data piped into your own agents, Screenpipe's API-first approach may still fit better.

How is Mnema different from Screenpipe?

Screenpipe has evolved into a context layer for AI agents — you record everything and plug the data into agents and integrations. Mnema is a finished personal-memory app: recording, timeline, search, and ask-AI work out of the box with nothing to assemble, and agents are still served through a brokered, read-only CLI when you want them.

Does Mnema send my recordings to the cloud?

No. Capture, text extraction, transcription, and search all run on-device — there's no account, no servers, and no telemetry. The one exception is opt-in: you can use your own Deepgram account for higher-accuracy transcripts, and audio leaves your Mac only if you turn that on.