A clipboard manager for Mac that also reaches the Mac beside it

What a clipboard manager on a Mac actually does

It records. Every time you press Copy, the item goes into a list you can open later and search, instead of being overwritten and lost. That is the job, and it is worth being clear that nothing recovers a copy made before the app was running — a recorder can only keep what it was there for.

macOS itself does not keep that list on macOS 14 or 15. On macOS 26 Tahoe, Spotlight gained a clipboard view, so there is now something built in; before that there was nothing to open at all. An app still earns its place by searching the record, keeping it longer, and deciding what never gets recorded.

Deskferry records text, contact details, images, files and folders. Search covers the saved text, contact fields, file names and folder names, and it works on every plan, including Free.

What Deskferry keeps, and where it stays

The record lives on the Mac that made the copy. It is not uploaded, not merged with another Mac's, and there is no account or cloud service in the path — so there is no shared library to browse and nothing of yours sitting on a server.

Free fully opens the 20 most recent records: you see the whole item and can copy it back. Older entries stay searchable and visible as summaries or restricted previews, and a paid plan opens them in full. Nothing is deleted when a paid plan ends.

By default a Mac keeps up to 10 GB of history with no time limit set. Capacity is still a ceiling: when it fills, the oldest entries go first, so how far back you can look is something to tune rather than assume. What retention actually controls goes through each setting.

What this clipboard manager for Mac adds: the second Mac

Most clipboard managers stop at one machine. If you move between a laptop and a desktop, the paragraph you copied on one is still only on that one, and the usual workarounds are email to yourself or a note app.

Deskferry pairs the two directly. The administrator chooses Add Mac, the other Mac chooses Join a Group and types a 6-digit code that lasts 120 seconds, and the administrator approves it. After that the Macs pass copies to each other over a local network they can both reach — no shared Apple ID, so a work Mac managed by an employer and a personal Mac can be in the same group.

Text, addresses and images cross on every plan. Files and videos need Pro or Max, folders need Max, and a transfer is capped at 100 MB by default.

What it does not do

It does not merge histories. Each Mac keeps its own record, so you cannot sit at the desktop and browse what the laptop copied last Tuesday. What travels between Macs is the copy you are making now, not the list of the ones before it.

It does not reach an iPhone or an iPad, and it is not a general-purpose snippet tool: there are no saved clips, tags, collections or text transformations. If those are what you came for, the comparison of the Mac clipboard managers is the more useful page.

Requirements, and how to install it

One Mac on macOS 14 or later is enough for history alone, since the record never leaves the machine. Passing copies between Macs asks for the app on both and a local network each can reach — one on Ethernet and one on Wi-Fi is fine, as long as the network lets them see each other.

It is on the Mac App Store as a free download, with Pro and Max sold as in-app purchases. The download page has what to check before you install.