Recording screens can come in real handy in many situations. You might want to record a how-to video for your non-techie friend, or you want to record the abrupt behavior of some application on your Windows machine. Screen recording can prove to be a very useful and efficient tool in multiple scenarios.
Windows even has a built-in tool for capturing screens, however, there are some limitations to it, which restricts its usage to specific scenarios. However, with Windows being so widely used, there is no surprise there are many third-party applications available as well. In this guide, we are going to check out some of the best available options.
Using Xbox Game Bar App to Record Screen on Windows 11
Windows 11 has a built-in ‘Game Bar’ app that is enabled by default, and it lets you record your screen flawlessly without any hassle, but there’s a catch to it. The Game Bar application does not offer the feature to record your whole screen or file explorer. You can only record applications with no control over the region of recording whatsoever.
If you are someone who wants to show off that complex move you pulled of in your favorite game or provide a navigation how-to the Game Bar app might be your best native option.
To record your screen using the Game Bar app, first launch the application from the file explorer or the Start Menu on your Windows machine you would like to record.
Next, launch the Game Bar app by pressing Windows+G keys together on your keyboard, and choose the ‘Capture’ option from the Game Bar present on the top section of your screen.
The Game Bar app allows you to choose if you would like to include verbal clues or narration in the recording.
To do so, press on the ‘Mic’ button present on the ‘Capture’ pane usually present on the left side section of the screen. Alternatively, you can also press Windows+Alt+M to toggle the Mic on or off.
Now, click on the ‘Start Recording’ button on the ‘Capture’ pane to start recording the application. Alternatively, you can also press Windows+Alt+R on your keyboard to start/stop recording.
Once the screen recording starts, the Capture pane and the Xbox Game Bar will be minimized and you will be able to see the ‘Capture Status’ pane which is usually present on the right edge of the screen.
To toggle off the recording, you can either use the shortcut by pressing Windows+Alt+R on your keyboard or by clicking on the ‘Recording button’ from the Capture Status pane.
Once you toggle off the screen recording, you will notice a banner on the right edge of the screen, notifying you that the clip has been recorded. Tap on it to open the list of all screen recordings and screenshots.
Alternatively, you can also click on the ‘Show all captures’ button present on the toolbar to open the Gallery view of the Game Bar app.
In the Gallery view, you can preview the screen recording by clicking on the ‘Play’ button present on the screen. You can also adjust the sound or cast the screen recording to a compatible device using the options provided on each edge of the preview space.
To edit the name of the recording, tap on the ‘Edit’ icon situated right below the preview space on the screen. Information regarding the screen recording, like the name of the application, date of the recording, and file size will also be available below the file name.
You can also jump to the file location in file explorer or delete the recording from the options available on the bottom right section of the Gallery view.
Xbox Game Bar app is one tremendous solution to screen record natively in Windows 11. However, its limitation to record only applications and no option for recording file explorer do not let it top the list.
Using Third-Party Applications to Record Screen on Windows 11
There are many capable screen recording applications available for the Windows platform. Since it is not possible to include each and every one of them here, let’s see some of the best options available.
Free Cam
Free cam is ad-free freeware for screen recording on the Windows platform. It is easy to use, basic, but a very capable screen recorder for people who need to occasionally record their screen and also need to tweak and trim their recordings according to their liking.
There is a free version and a paid version of Free Cam. The paid version will set you back by $227/year. That being said, the free version is also not half bad with almost all key functionalities being available without any watermark or time limit for the screen recording.
To start using Free cam, first, download it from their official website freescreenrecording.com by entering your email address and then clicking on the download button.
Once downloaded, Install the Free Cam software on your Windows machine. You can find the setup file in your browser’s download directory set by you. If you haven’t set the downloads directory, the default directory is your ‘Downloads’ folder.
After installation, run the Free Cam software by either double-clicking the shortcut present on the desktop or from the Start Menu of Windows.
Once the Free Cam window opens, click on the ‘New Recording’ button from the screen.
To start screen recording with Free Cam using the default settings (which is 1280×720 pixels fixed region, without external audio recording), click on the ‘Record’ button present under the bottom left corner of the frame visible on the screen.
Otherwise, if you want to change the fixed region size, change the height or width of the region by editing the values on the toolbar. (Values are in pixels)
To reposition the fixed region, click and hold the right mouse button on the ‘Four arrows’ icon from the center of the screen, and drag it to reposition the frame on the screen.
To manually adjust the size, you can click and drag any of the vertex of the frame.
Alternatively, you can also adjust your frame size aspect ratio, draw a fixed region, or capture whole screen recording by clicking on the ‘downward carat’ icon on the toolbar present below the recording frame.
You can also select a specific application to record from Free Cam. Click the ‘downward carat’ icon from the toolbar present on the toolbar under the frame. Then, navigate to the ‘Select application’ option from the list and finally, choose the application you want to record from the available options.
The Free Cam also allows you to choose if you would like to include verbal clues or narration for the recording. To enable it, press on the ‘Mic’ button present right beside the ‘Record’ button.
Once all your preferences have been set, click on the ‘Record’ button present under the bottom left corner of the frame visible on the screen.
Then, a countdown of 3 seconds will begin on your screen, before the Free Cam starts recording.
If you wish to pause the video in between recordings, you can do that by clicking the ‘pause icon’ button present at the same location as the ‘Record’ button. To stop recording, click the ‘Done’ button or press Esc on your keyboard.
After pressing Esc on your keyboard, Free Cam will open the recorded video in a preview pane. You can choose to edit the video using the ‘Edit’ option to open the in-built editor.
(Or in the case, no edit is required you can also save the video to your local storage by clicking on the ‘Save as Video’ option, or straight away upload it to YouTube by clicking on the ‘Upload to YouTube’ option from the ribbon menu.)
The in-built editor provides you reasonable options like delete frame, silence audio, trim frame, remove noise, adjusting volume intensity, audio fade in/fade out for representing a transition, and much more which are available on the ribbon menu of the editor.
You can also mute audio by clicking the ‘Silence Selection’ and delete the video frame by clicking on the ‘Delete’ option from the timeline editor by right-clicking on the desired frame.
Once, you are done with the editing of your recording. Click ‘Save and Close’ to return to the previous window.
After editing, you can either choose to save the recording to your local storage by clicking on the ‘Save as Video’ option or straight away upload it to YouTube by clicking on the ‘Upload to YouTube’ option from the ribbon menu.
To have more control over your screen recordings. From the region selection screen of Free Cam, click on the ‘Settings’ icon present on the toolbar under the bottom left corner of the frame on the screen.
Now from the ‘General’ tab, you can change the hotkeys for basic operations such as pause, stop, or discard the recording.
You can also choose from the available microphones for when recording external audio, by clicking the dropdown menu. You can also adjust the intensity of your microphone using the slider.
After that, you can also control to record system sounds in your recording by checking or unchecking the tick box preceding the ‘Record system sounds’ field.
For control over the application behavior, and mouse cursor settings during the recording, head to the ‘Advanced’ tab. Then, check/uncheck the options depending on your requirement. Then click ‘OK’ to close the Settings pane.
Free Cam offers great control over the creation process for beginners and offers great value with its in-built video editor. A pretty easy-to-use interface and good performance make it a very good option.
ActivePresenter
The ActivePresenter provides you with decent screen capturing options and video editing options along with an option to annotate the video, add transitions, animations and can even record from your in-built webcam as well.
Though ActivePresenter has a free version and a paid version, you can use the free version perpetually ad-free and without any watermark. However, some of the advanced features like audio fade in/out, noise reduction, and green-screen are only available in the paid version of the software.
To start using ActivePresenter, first, download the app by going to atomisystems.com/download.
Once downloaded, install the ActivePresenter software on your Windows machine. You can find the setup file in your browser’s download directory set by you. The default directory is your ‘Downloads’ folder.
After installation, run the ActivePresenter software by either double-clicking the shortcut present on the desktop or from the Start Menu of Windows.
From the home screen of ActivePresenter, click on the ‘Record Video’ button.
Before you start capturing your screen, you would most probably need to configure the available options according to your needs.
Now, to record the whole screen, click on the ‘Full Screen’ option from the ‘Recording Area’. Otherwise, click the ‘Custom’ option to set your preferred fixed region.
When a custom fixed region is set, you can click-hold the right mouse button and drag the screen recording area from the ‘Crosshair’ icon present in the center of the area to reposition it.
Also, to manually adjust the size of the recording area, click-hold and drag any of the vertexes of the screen recording area.
You can also lock the screen recording to a particular application by checking the ‘Lock to application’ option. Then, choose the preferred application by clicking on the dropdown menu.
Then, click on the ‘Webcam’ option to toggle the webcam on or off for the recording. You can also choose which webcam to turn on (if you have more than one) by clicking on the ‘carat’ icon.
Next, click on the ‘carat’ icon situated beside the ‘Mic’ icon to choose if you want to record system sounds or external sounds using the integrated mic.
If you want to record neither, click on the ‘Mic’ icon to not include both of them in the screen recording.
To start the screen recording, after all the preferences have been set, click on the big red ‘REC’ button.
Once started, you can pause the screen recording by clicking on the ‘Pause icon’ button from the recording toolbar. To end the recording, click on the ‘Stop’ icon. Alternatively, you can also press Ctrl+End on the keyboard to end the recording.
You can slo discard the recording by clicking on the ‘X’ icon present on the toolbar.
ActivePresenter offers one of the most comprehensive video editors out of all available options. The editor covers a very wide spectrum and can cater to a very wide audience requiring very different needs.
ActivePresenter video editor offers you complete control over each audio and video component’s individual timeline, just like a typical video editor. Some of the basic operations available, but definitely not limited to are:
- Preview Recording: Play all the audio and video components together.
- Stop: Stop playing all the audio and video components together.
- Narration: Record a narration for the screen recording.
- Split: Split selected audio or video objects in their timeline.
- Captions: Insert captions in the screen recording.
You can also create and add slides to your screen recordings using the ribbon menu present on the top section of the screen. Since it is almost identical to Microsoft PowerPoint, the majority of the users should not have any major issues navigating their way.
Once you are done editing your screen recording, click on the ‘Export’ option from the toolbar present on the top section of the screen.
Then, click on the ‘Video’ option from the ribbon menu.
Now, under the ‘General’ tab, check or uncheck fields appropriate for your video from ‘Rendering Options’.
After that, there are plenty of options to control each and every aspect of your recording’s visual aspect. This one does require some explaining for the sake of better output.
- Video Size(%): As the field depicts, the value is in percentage. This field will scale your screen recording to the entered value percentage relative to your recording’s original size.
- Frame Rate: Frame Rate is the playback speed of your video, while we are used to watching playback speed at 30 FPS, the higher the number the more fluid and natural the video feels. However, do remember to play a higher frame rate video, the screen playing the video should also support a higher refresh rate.
- Quality: The value here depicts the quality of your rendered video. The higher the number the better the quality, however as the quality increases, size also increases. (The value ranges between 1-100, higher being better.)
- Width/Height: These fields will typically alter themselves as you change the ‘Video Size (%)’ field. However, you can also manually alter the height or width yourself by changing the values in the field. That being said, please remember manually changing the values may disturb the aspect ratio of the screen recording and hamper the viewing experience.
Next section pertains to audio behavior of the recording. You can select the ‘Channels’, ‘Bit Rate’, and ‘Sample Rate’ by using their respective drop-downs. If you do not know to configure these options, or your recording is not audio intensive, feel free to leave this options at their default values.
After that, from the ‘Output’ section, you can choose your preferred output format for the recording by clicking on the drop down menu.
Finally, click on the ‘Browse’ option from the right most section of the pane to choose your destination on the local drive to save the screen recording. Then, click ‘OK’ button to save the video.
It might take few minutes to export the file depending on the size of your screen recording.
Once exported, ActivePresenter might give you an alert, read it and click on ‘Yes’ to view your exported file(s).
ActivePresenter is definitely not for the average joey to create a quick screen recording. ActivePresenter has the potential to churn out professional-level screen recordings or how-to presentations and is best suited for content creation enthusiasts or professionals.
Ezvid
The Ezvid is one of the most easy-to-use screen recording freeware, and probably one of the lightest too. That being said, Ezvid does pack a punch when it comes to performance and is pretty fast compared to its competition.
Along with basic functionalities like a recording from an in-built webcam, adding a self-narration in the video, or adding background music in the recording, Ezvid also offers a ‘Speech Synthesis’ option which is capable of making a computer narration for your recording using a text slide.
To start using Ezvid, first, go to their official website ezvid.com/download and click on the ‘Download’ button (as seen in the screenshot below).
Once downloaded, Install the Ezvid software on your Windows machine. You can find the setup file in your browser’s download directory set by you. The default directory is your ‘Downloads’ folder.
After installation, run the Ezvid software by either double-clicking the shortcut present on the desktop or from the Start Menu of Windows.
Now to start recording your screen using Ezvid, click on the ‘Capture’ button from the main screen of Ezvid.
Then, if you want to record the screen using the default settings (which is full-screen recording without any audio input), click on the ‘start capture now’ button.
If you want to tailor your screen recording according to your experience, click on the ‘use advanced settings’ button from the overlay pane.
Then, you can click on the icon of each individual option to toggle it on or off. Turned on options will be highlighted in yellow.
Once you have all the options set to your preference, click on the ‘start advanced capture now’ to start recording your screen.
If you have turned on the ‘Select Capture Area Enabled’ option, you will need to draw the area for your screen capture. Click-hold your right button on the mouse, and then drag it across the screen to adjust the size.
After that, a countdown of 3 seconds will be visible before the screen recording commences. If you wish to cancel the recording or want to go back to change some preferences, you can do that by pressing Esc on your keyboard.
Once the screen record has started, you will be able to see the Ezvid toolbar on the bottom left corner of your screen. You can either, pause, stop, or draw a shape on the screen using the toolbar.
To draw on the screen, click the ‘DRAW’ option from the toolbar.
Then either select a shape to insert from the provided options, or click on the ‘Paint On Screen’ option present on the top of the ‘TOOLS’ overlay menu.
To stop recording, click on the ‘STOP’ button from the toolbar present on the bottom left corner of the screen.
After that, Ezvid will open your screen recording in the preview space you already saw on the main screen before starting the recording.
Now, enter an appropriate title and description for the video from their respective text areas.
Next, choose a video category by clicking on the drop-down menu situated under the description box on the screen.
Then, you can also add pre-loaded background music to your recording as well from the drop-down menu under the ‘music’ field from the left section of the window.
After that, use the slider to control the background music volume in the screen recording.
You can also add a watermark of your choice by clicking on the ‘add watermark’ button, then locating the file on your local storage to import.
Now, to preview your recording, press the ‘Play’ icon present on the lower-left section of the Ezvid window.
You can also create a new project, load an existing project, undo your last action, redo an action, and zoom in/zoom out on the editor timeline from the options available.
Then, to add narration to your video, click on the ‘Mic’ icon present at the lower right section of the Ezvid window.
You can also add synthesized speech, text slides, or add existing videos and pictures from your local storage to your screen recording.
Note: Synthesized speech will only convert the text added using the ‘add text’ button from the toolbar.
Finally, to save the screen recording, click the ‘save video’ button from the bottom right corner of the windows
Once the video is rendered, you will be able to locate them in the following directory.
C:\Users\Parth\Documents\ezvid\projects\final
Well people, these were some of the great options available to record screens on Windows 11. You can choose anyone depending on the intricate features required by you.
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