QuietClip vs Paste — Why pay $30/year for clipboard history?
Paste is polished. It's also a subscription that uploads your clipboard to iCloud. QuietClip gives you the same features for a one-time price, with everything stored locally.
TL;DR
- Choose Paste if you need iCloud sync across multiple Macs and don't mind paying $30/year.
- Choose QuietClip if you want the same image, file, and text clipboard history without a subscription or cloud dependency.
- Both have modern UIs. The difference is privacy and pricing.
Everything Paste does, minus the subscription.
| Feature | QuietClip | Paste |
|---|---|---|
| Pricing | Free + $8.99 once | $30/year or $90 lifetime |
| Images & files | ||
| Rich text support | ||
| Visual previews | ||
| Search | ||
| Local-only storage | — | |
| Zero network connections | — | |
| Zero telemetry | — | |
| iCloud sync | — | |
| No account required | — | |
| Modern UI (SwiftUI) | ||
| Keyboard shortcuts | ||
| Pin favorites | ||
| Source app tracking | ||
| Under 5 MB | — | |
| AI features | — | Yes (buggy) |
Your clipboard doesn't belong in the cloud.
Paste stores your entire clipboard history in iCloud. Every password you accidentally copy, every private message, every confidential document snippet — it all goes to Apple's servers. You have to trust both Paste and Apple with that data.
QuietClip stores everything in a local SwiftData database on your Mac. Zero network connections, zero cloud uploads, zero accounts. Your clipboard data never leaves your machine.
For anyone handling sensitive information — developers, lawyers, healthcare workers, or just privacy-conscious users — this isn't a minor difference. It's the whole point.
$30/year adds up. $8.99 once doesn't.
Paste charges $30 per year. After three years, you've spent $90 on clipboard history. Stop paying, and you lose access to your history.
QuietClip's Pro upgrade is $8.99. Once. No expiration, no renewal, no "your trial has ended" popups. The free tier already gives you 25 items of text history with search and keyboard shortcuts — most people never need more.
Paste also offers a $90 lifetime option, but that's still ten times what QuietClip Pro costs for essentially the same feature set minus cloud sync.
Paste added AI. Users aren't happy.
Paste recently introduced "Paste AI" — AI-powered search and categorization. The problem? Multiple users report it broke their existing search functionality. Features that worked before now return wrong results.
QuietClip takes the opposite approach: fast, reliable, local search that does exactly what you expect. No AI inference, no cloud processing, no features that break other features. Clipboard managers should be invisible tools that just work.
What you actually pay.
Free / $8.99 once
Free tier with 25 items. One-time $8.99 Pro upgrade for unlimited history, images, files, and pins.
$30/yr
Annual subscription required. $90 lifetime option available. Requires iCloud account. Lose access when you stop paying.
Same features. No subscription. No cloud.
Paste is a good clipboard manager held back by its business model. If you don't need iCloud sync, there's no reason to pay $30 every year for features QuietClip provides for a one-time $8.99.
Download QuietClip and try it free. If you like it, upgrade once and you're done.
macOS 14+ (Sonoma and later) · Apple Silicon & Intel · Under 5 MB