Paste is the most popular clipboard manager on the Mac. It has been around for years, has a loyal user base, and looks great. I built reClip because I thought there was room for something different. Here is an honest look at how the two compare.
Price
This is the biggest practical difference. Paste costs $29.99 per year with no free tier. There is a short trial, but after that you pay or you stop using it.
reClip has a free version that keeps your last 20 clips. It works indefinitely without paying anything. Pro is $2.99/month or $17.99/year for unlimited history, search, and advanced features.
If you are not sure whether a clipboard manager is worth it, reClip lets you find out without committing money. Paste does not.
Interface
Both apps use a horizontal strip that appears at the bottom of your screen. They look similar at first glance, but the interaction is different.
Paste slides up from the bottom edge with a smooth animation. It shows clip previews in a horizontal timeline. You click or use arrow keys to navigate.
reClip appears as a floating overlay. I spent a lot of time making the arrow key navigation fast. The selection and scrolling are handled entirely through AppKit, which means there is no lag even with hundreds of clips. You can also press number keys 1-9 to quickly paste recent items without scrolling at all.
Sync
Both apps sync through iCloud. Paste syncs between Mac, iPhone, and iPad. reClip currently syncs between Macs, with an iOS app in development.
If you need iPhone access right now, Paste wins here. If you primarily work on Macs, both work the same way.
Both use Apple's private CloudKit database, so your clipboard data stays in your iCloud account. Neither company can read your clips.
Privacy
This is where I think reClip has a meaningful advantage. reClip automatically detects sensitive content like passwords, API keys, bearer tokens, and OTP codes, and skips saving them. You do not have to configure anything. It just works.
Paste does not have this feature. Everything you copy gets saved, including passwords and secrets. You can manually delete items, but by then they have already been saved and potentially synced.
Content types
Both handle text, rich text, images, and URLs. reClip also detects hex color codes and shows visual swatches, which is useful if you work with design tools. Both can handle file copies from Finder.
Distribution
Paste is only available through the Mac App Store. reClip is available on the App Store and as a direct DMG download. The direct version includes auto-paste (it simulates Cmd+V after you select a clip) and Sparkle auto-updates. The App Store version cannot do auto-paste due to Apple's restrictions.
Organization
Both apps have pinboards (Paste calls them that too) for organizing clips into groups. Both let you pin clips. Both have search.
Paste lets you create custom pinboards and drag clips between them. reClip does the same, and also supports tags and custom ordering within pinboards. In practice, the organization features are similar.
Performance
I am obviously biased here, but reClip is faster. The overlay opens without any SwiftUI re-rendering delay because I moved the critical path to pure AppKit. Arrow key navigation has zero perceptible lag. Search is debounced at 150ms so it does not stutter on fast typing.
Paste is not slow by any means. But if you are navigating through clips quickly with arrow keys, you can feel a slight delay on each keystroke. Whether this matters depends on how you use it.
Who should use which
Choose Paste if: you need an iOS app today, you do not mind the $30/year subscription, and you want the most established option.
Choose reClip if: you want a free tier to start, privacy matters to you (sensitive content detection), you want a direct download option with auto-paste, or you care about raw speed.
Both are good clipboard managers. I would not tell anyone to switch from Paste if they are happy with it. But if you are starting fresh or reconsidering your options, give reClip a try. The free version costs nothing and takes 30 seconds to set up.