Clippy vs Bandicam: a free Bandicam alternative for game clips
Bandicam is a long-established screen and game recorder for Windows, sold as a licence. Clippy has one job: keep the last minutes of your game ready and save them with one key.
What Clippy does
- Free, with no watermark. Supporters pay for cosmetics and extra storage, never for the recorder.
- Recording starts when a game starts and stops when it closes. No profiles to set up.
- One key (F8 by default) saves the last minute. The buffer goes up to three minutes.
- Records the game window rather than the whole screen.
- On Windows 11, game, desktop and microphone land on separate tracks you can rebalance before sharing.
- An editor and one link to share, with clean embeds on Discord and X. Viewers need no account.
Where Bandicam is different
- A full screen recorder: it can record your whole screen or a region as well as a game.
- Sold as a licence, with a free version that has limits.
- A long list of recording settings for people who want them.
Check bandicam.com for Bandicam's current features and prices.
Which one fits
Pick Clippy if you want free and automatic. Pick Bandicam if you also need to record your whole screen or other windows and are fine with a licence.
Switching from Bandicam?
Clippy can copy MP4 and MKV clips from any folder on your PC into its library, so your old Bandicam recordings can come along with their original dates. How clip import works.
Last updated November 4, 2026. All comparisons.