Cap vs OBS Studio
Learn how Cap and OBS Studio differ in their key features, development activity, technology
stack and community adoption, so you can decide which of these screen recording tools is best for you.
Learn how Cap and OBS Studio differ in their key features, development activity, technology stack and community adoption, so you can decide which of these screen recording tools is best for you.
Cap
Last 30 days
Last commit
16 hours agoRepository age
3 yearsVersion
v0.5.9License
AGPL-3.0Self-hosted
YesRepository
capsoftware/cap
OBS Studio
Last 30 days
Last commit
10 hours agoRepository age
13 yearsVersion
32.2.2License
GPL-2.0Repository
obsproject/obs-studio
Detailed Comparison
Both Cap and OBS Studio have their unique strengths and serve similar purposes effectively. Consider your specific needs regarding popularity, growth, activity, technology, maturity, licensing and features when making your decision.
Both Cap and OBS Studio have their unique strengths and serve similar purposes effectively. Consider your specific needs regarding popularity, growth, activity, technology, maturity, licensing and features when making your decision.
Community & Popularity
OBS Studio significantly outpaces Cap in community adoption with 75,706 stars compared to 21,427 stars on GitHub. This 3.5x difference suggests OBS Studio has a much larger and more active community. In terms of developer contributions, OBS Studio has 9,971 forks, indicating strong developer engagement.
Growth Momentum
Cap is growing faster, adding 983 stars in the last 30 days (+4.8%) against adding 1,318 stars for OBS Studio (+1.8%). Cap is the smaller project of the two, so it is closing the gap rather than extending a lead.
Development Activity
Both projects show recent activity, with Cap last updated 16 hours ago and OBS Studio 10 hours ago.
Technology Stack
Both tools share common technology foundations, being built with CSS, Bash. However, they differ in their additional technology choices: Cap uses JavaScript, Typescript, JSX, Next.js, Rust, Tauri while OBS Studio leverages Python, C, Objective-C, Swift, C++, MATLAB, Lua.
Project Maturity
OBS Studio has been in development longer, starting 13 years ago, compared to Cap which began 3 years ago. This 10.3-year head start suggests OBS Studio may have more mature features and established processes.
Licensing
The projects use different licenses: Cap is licensed under AGPL-3.0 while OBS Studio uses GPL-2.0. Consider the licensing requirements when choosing for your project.
Use Cases & Features
Both tools serve similar use cases in Screen Recording.
Hosting & Deployment
Cap provides self-hosting options for complete data control and customization, while OBS Studio may be primarily cloud-based or require different deployment approaches.
ScreenshotOne – The screenshot API for developers. Render screenshots in one simple API call