Handoff Download

Getting started

Handoff records how you work through a process on your computer and turns it into step-by-step documentation, with screenshots: for training, audits, automation, or whoever does it next. This page gets you to your first guide; the user guide has everything else.

What you need

  • A Mac with macOS 12 or later, Apple silicon or Intel. Windows 10 and 11 and Linux versions are previews: they are built and tested automatically but have not yet been tried by hand.
  • Permission to record. Handoff takes screenshots of the window you are working in. On work systems, check that your employer is happy with that.
  • Ten minutes for the first recording.

Installing

Mac. Open the disk image (Handoff_<version>_aarch64.dmg for Apple silicon, Handoff_<version>_x64.dmg for Intel) and drag Handoff to Applications. It is signed and notarised by Apple, so it opens like any other app. Then:

  1. On the Settings tab, press Grant for Screen Recording, Accessibility and Input Monitoring. macOS opens System Settings for each; turn Handoff on there (Mac permissions explains each one).
  2. Quit Handoff (Cmd-Q) and open it again: macOS only applies Screen Recording after a restart. Move the mouse, then check that Settings shows Input hook verified.

Windows. Run Handoff_<version>_x64-setup.exe. It is not yet signed, so Windows may say it protected your PC: choose More info, then Run anyway. The MSI package is for IT departments installing it on many computers.

Linux. Make the AppImage executable (chmod +x Handoff_<version>_amd64.AppImage) and run it, or install the .deb or .rpm. On Wayland, add yourself to the input group once (sudo usermod -aG input $USER, then log out and in). Settings → This desktop shows what works on yours.

Keeping things private

  • In Settings → Never record these, add the apps that must stay private (Mail, Messages, WhatsApp, your password manager, your bank). Recording pauses while one of them is in front.
  • Password fields are never recorded, and Handoff blurs email addresses, card numbers, phone numbers and codes it finds on screenshots.
  • Everything stays on your computer. There is no account and no upload. A guide is only shared when you export it and send it to someone yourself. Privacy and the network lists every connection Handoff makes.

A model to write the guide

Settings → Local model suggests one for your computer’s memory:

  • On macOS 26 with Apple Intelligence on, Apple’s on-device model needs nothing installed.
  • Otherwise install Ollama, open it, and press Download next to the suggested model in Settings (a few GB, once).

Without a model, Handoff still makes the guide, with plain step names you edit yourself.

Your first guide

  1. Record a real task you do regularly: on the Record tab, type its name, press Record, do the task as usual, press Stop, then Review.
  2. Check what was captured, write the guide, fix any wording, and export it.
  3. Give the exported guide to someone and ask them to do the task from it, ideally with Follow this guide, which shows one step at a time beside their work.
  4. Record the same task again on another day: Handoff then learns which steps are always done and which only sometimes.

If something goes wrong

Settings → Problems → Report a problem… shows exactly what will be sent before your email app opens; nothing is sent until you press Send. For anything else, write to james@likeclockwork.org.

New versions appear on the download page; there are no automatic updates yet.