How to automatically sync screenshots between Mac, iPhone and iPad

CloudShots automatically syncs screenshots in both directions between Mac, iPhone and iPad through iCloud. Install CloudShots on each device and stay signed in to the same iCloud account. From then on, what you capture on the Mac reaches your iPhone and iPad, and what lands in the Screenshots album on your iPhone or iPad reaches your Mac, in one history, on the free plan exactly as on Pro.

  1. Install CloudShots on each device and sign in to the same iCloud account. There is no CloudShots account to create.
  2. On iPhone or iPad, give Photos full access when onboarding asks. iOS hides the Screenshots album under limited access. CloudShots then imports that album in the background and picks up every new screenshot as you take it.
  3. On Mac, confirm the folder your screenshots already go to (Desktop is pre-selected) and grant access once. Screenshots you take with CloudShots on the Mac join the same history directly.
  4. Watch it finish in Settings, where separate counters cover upload, download, indexing, and import. The overall figure reaches 100% only once all of them are genuinely done.
  5. Re-run the import later, or change the Mac folder, from Settings on that device.
  • Get iPhone screenshots on your Mac: Install CloudShots on your Mac and sign in to the same iCloud account. The imported iPhone screenshots appear in the Mac panel automatically, with no folder to check and nothing to drag over.
  • Get Mac screenshots on your iPhone: Open CloudShots on your iPhone or iPad, signed in to the same iCloud account. The Mac screenshot is already there, with no export, no AirDrop, no email to yourself.
  • Mac: a slide-in panel over your current window, with filters for where a screenshot came from: Mac, iPhone, iPad, Apple Watch, or CarPlay.
  • iPhone and iPad: the same history, plus the annotation and redaction editor, whose edits sync with the screenshot.
  • Apple Watch: your recent synced screenshots, read-only, read from iCloud directly. No capture and no editing there.

Apple Watch and CarPlay screenshots reach the history through your iPhone.

  • The screenshot's image and its history record sync through iCloud, the same private container CloudShots uses for everything.
  • iOS and iPadOS only ever import what the system already captured to the Screenshots album; CloudShots does not take screenshots on those devices.
  • macOS is the one platform CloudShots captures on directly, in addition to importing the folder you choose.
  • Captures the full screen, a region, or a single window on Mac, with the screen frozen while you select and a capture pinnable on screen, and imports what iOS or iPadOS already captured to the Screenshots album.
  • Keeps one timeline across every device, filterable by source: Mac, iPhone, iPad, Apple Watch, or CarPlay.
  • Searches the text and objects inside a screenshot, not just its filename, and understands relative dates like "last week".
  • Annotates, crops, and redacts (text, faces, or a chosen object) non-destructively: only the owner can restore the original, on the device that made the edit, while online.
  • Picks out verification codes, passwords, links, emails, and addresses to copy directly from a screenshot.
  • Reads QR codes and barcodes.

iCloud Photos syncs the screenshots in your Photos library across your devices once it is turned on, but a Mac screenshot reaches it only when you move it into Photos, and it sits among every other photo.

iCloud Drive syncs only the files you place there, which you find by file name, and AirDrop sends one item at a time from one device to another, so every transfer is manual and nothing is kept.

CloudShots captures on the Mac directly, imports the iPhone and iPad Screenshots album automatically, and keeps both in one searchable history in your own iCloud, with no CloudShots account.

  • Sync itself is free. Uploads, downloads, and the shared history are identical on Free and Pro.
  • On Free, the newest 30 screenshots are the ones you can open. Older ones keep syncing and stay stored on the device and in iCloud, shown locked. Pro opens all of them. Full originals stay on every device across your whole history size (Unlimited: all), on both plans.
  • Without iCloud, everything local still works: capture, import, history, search, editing. Only the shared history needs it. iCloud storage is billed by Apple.
  • How large the history may grow is a separate setting on both plans, 1,000 screenshots by default and adjustable from 200 upward. Out of the box it deletes nothing. Enforcement only runs after you move the slider and confirm. Lowering it below your current history is what’s destructive: it permanently deletes the oldest screenshots past the new limit on every device, after a confirmation naming the number. Raising it, including to Unlimited, deletes nothing and asks nothing. CloudShots never deletes anything from your Photos library or your Mac’s screenshot folder on its own. Free Up Your Photos on iPhone and iPad, and Free Up Your Mac, remove synced originals only after you confirm. The Delete dialog on both plans also offers Move to Trash and Delete from Photos (Folder on Mac), your choice per deletion.
  • iPhone, iPad, Mac, and Apple Watch only.

One history, every device.

No. Sync is automatic and shared: a screenshot from either device joins the same history on all of them. There is no one-way switch.

No. Once CloudShots is installed and signed in to the same iCloud account on both devices, transfer is automatic in both directions.

No. CloudShots has no account system and no screenshot server. Your history syncs privately through iCloud, so signing in to the same iCloud account on each device is the whole setup.

No. Uploads, downloads, and cross-device history work the same on Free and Pro. The plan changes how much of that synced history you can open, not how much of it syncs.

iOS hides the Screenshots album under limited access, so CloudShots cannot see your screenshots without full access. It reads that album and imports it; nothing in Photos is removed unless you ask for it.

It shows your recent synced history read-only, reading from iCloud directly. There is no capture and no editing on the watch.

Yes, minus the sync. Capture, import, history, search, and editing are local. Only the shared history across devices needs iCloud, and iCloud storage is billed by Apple, not by CloudShots.

No. Sync runs through your own private iCloud, which is built into your Apple devices: screenshots appear on every device by themselves, Apple Watch included, with no extra account, and your edits and the text found inside follow them. Only you see them unless you share, and there is no CloudShots server in between. A general file storage service has nothing like that built in, so it cannot work the same way.

No. iOS keeps the system's Screenshots album; CloudShots imports what is already there in the background. On the Mac, CloudShots captures the screenshot itself.

CloudShots still works: capture, import, search, and editing are all local. Installing it on a second device with the same iCloud account is what starts the shared history.

No. iCloud Photos syncs every photo; CloudShots keeps a separate, searchable history of just your screenshots, with recognition and editing iCloud Photos does not do.

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