CleanShot X

The screenshot tool macOS should have shipped, and a competent recorder alongside it.

What it does

CleanShot X replaces ⌘⇧4 entirely. Captures land in an overlay rather than on the Desktop, so they can be annotated, copied, pinned to the screen or thrown away before a file ever exists. Scrolling capture stitches a full page; window capture gets a real shadow and a transparent background; the cursor can be hidden, and the desktop icons with it.

Recording covers screen and camera to MP4 or GIF, with keystrokes shown on screen and clicks highlighted — the features that make a short how-to clip legible without editing it.

Notes

The annotation tools are where the time is saved: arrows, blurring for anything sensitive, step counters, and text that stays editable until export.
Captures can go straight to CleanShot Cloud for a link. That is an upload to someone else’s server — fine for a screenshot of a bug, not for anything with credentials on it.
Sold as a one-off licence with a year of updates, and also included in Setapp.

Alternative to

Alternative	Type	Trade-off
Shottr	Freemium	Most of the screenshot half, free, much smaller
`⌘⇧5` and Preview	Built in	Captures and basic markup, no overlay workflow
Screen Studio	Paid	Better recordings, no screenshot workflow to speak of
Snagit	Paid	The Windows-era incumbent, heavier and cross-platform
Flameshot	Open source	The free annotation-first option, and clumsier on a Mac