FastStone Capture is a lightweight Windows screen capture and recording utility that grabs windows, scrolling pages, and screen activity, then annotates, edits, and exports the results from one compact toolbar.
FastStone Capture is a small Windows utility built around a floating capture panel that stays within reach while you work. From that panel you grab a full screen, a single window, an object, a menu, a fixed-size or freehand region, or an entire scrolling page that extends beyond the visible window. Captures can be sent straight to the built-in editor, the clipboard, a printer, a file, or another application. In the editor you annotate, crop, resize, and convert images, or assemble several shots into one PDF. The same toolset also records screen activity, microphone and speaker audio, and webcam footage into video files, making FastStone Capture a single hub for visual communication tasks.
Where FastStone Capture fits best is routine explanation work: bug reports, tutorials, support replies, and step-by-step documentation. A scrolling window capture removes the tedious job of stitching several screenshots together, while the OCR option pulls editable text out of an image instead of forcing you to retype it. Pinned captures keep a reference image floating above other windows, which is handy when you compare figures across applications. Output options are equally practical: save in common formats, push straight to Word, Excel, PowerPoint, or OneNote, or turn a batch of shots into a single PDF. When those documents later need restructuring, a dedicated utility such as PDF Shaper Ultimate covers page-level tasks that a capture editor is not built for.
The main benefit of FastStone Capture is speed: capturing, annotating, and saving a screenshot takes seconds because every tool lives on one small panel rather than behind nested menus. That matters for anyone who documents work all day, from support agents and teachers to developers and technical writers. Because the editor is built in, you rarely need a second image program; callouts, arrows, highlights, blur, and captions are applied immediately, so screenshots can be handed over without extra polishing. Small touches add up as well: global hotkeys trigger a capture without breaking your flow, scheduled auto-capture records a process over time, and the portable build runs from a USB drive on machines where installing software is not an option. Recording features mean you can switch between still images and short clips in the same session, which keeps tutorials consistent. The result is a compact toolkit that replaces several separate utilities and reduces the back-and-forth that normally slows visual documentation down.
FastStone Capture offers a full set of capture modes so you can take exactly the shot you need. Grab the full screen, one window, a selected object, a dropdown menu, a fixed-size or freehand region, or several windows and multi-level menus at once. Because the same panel handles every mode, switching between a quick window grab and a precise region selection takes a single click, which keeps screenshots accurate instead of approximate.
FastStone Capture captures content that extends far past the visible screen instead of making you assemble it by hand. The scrolling mode automatically joins a long web page, chat thread, or document into one continuous image, and a custom mode handles windows that have no scroll bar at all. The result is a single clean screenshot that shows an entire page in context, which is far easier to annotate, share, and archive than a folder full of overlapping fragments.
Every capture can open in an integrated editor that covers most annotation and cleanup work. Add arrows, callouts, highlights, step numbers, text boxes, blur, watermarks, and visual effects, or crop, resize, rotate, sharpen, and adjust colors before saving. Tabs let you edit several screenshots side by side, and a lossless project format preserves your annotation objects so a finished image can be reopened and reworked later instead of being flattened forever.
FastStone Capture records screen activity together with microphone narration, system audio, webcam video, and mouse movements, so a spoken walkthrough carries the same detail as a written one. The recorder includes a video editor for trimming unwanted sections, adding annotations, title cards, and zoom effects, and converting a clip into an animated GIF. You can also schedule recordings with a timer, restrict capture to a fixed region or a window that follows the cursor, and export audio on its own when only narration is needed.
Rather than retyping text from a screenshot, the capture-text tool runs optical character recognition on an image and returns editable content you can paste into a document or ticket. It is useful for quoting error messages, lifting figures out of a screenshot, or reusing wording from reference material you no longer have in source form. Larger images are handled as well, so text-heavy reports and tables are practical targets.
Pinned captures in FastStone Capture float above other windows like sticky notes, which makes them genuinely useful during real work rather than only at capture time. Keep a reference figure visible while you type matching values into another application, compare two screenshots without a second monitor, or leave a checklist on screen as a visual reminder. Pins can be resized, annotated in draw mode, and closed with a keystroke, so they stay out of the way when no longer needed.
FastStone Capture sends finished work wherever it needs to go: the editor, the clipboard, a printer, a folder, email, a web server, or straight into OneNote, Word, Excel, and PowerPoint. Batch tools reduce repetitive jobs by combining several images into one file, printing multiple shots at once, and exporting a whole set of captures as a single PDF. Naming rules and automatic saving keep large documentation projects organized without manual file handling.
A set of small measurement and inspection tools ships alongside the capture features. A screen color picker reads any pixel and reports its value in several formats, a magnifier zooms in on fine detail, and a crosshair helps align elements or place a cursor precisely. A focus overlay dims everything except the area you are working in, while a calibrated ruler and protractor measure distances and angles on screen. Auto-capture can also repeat screenshots at set intervals for monitoring a long-running task.
Yes. The scrolling capture mode grabs long web pages, documents, and lists that extend past the visible area. It works automatically when a scroll bar is present and also offers a custom mode for windows without one, so you end up with a single continuous image.
Yes. The built-in screen recorder captures onscreen activity with microphone narration, speaker audio, webcam footage, and mouse clicks, then lets you trim and annotate the clip and save it as a compact video file or animated GIF.
Yes. FastStone Capture opens every capture in an integrated editor where you can add arrows, callouts, highlights, step numbers, text, watermarks, blur, and effects, plus crop, resize, rotate, and adjust colors before saving.
FastStone Capture is a Windows application, so it does not run natively on macOS or Linux. Windows users can also run the portable build from a USB drive without installing anything on the machine.
Yes. The Capture Text tool uses optical character recognition to turn text inside an image into editable content on modern Windows releases, which saves the effort of retyping messages, tables, or documentation excerpts.
Yes. FastStone Capture works across multiple monitors, handles high-DPI and 4K displays, and supports touch input, so the capture region is placed correctly on whatever screen arrangement you use.
Global hotkeys trigger the capture modes without opening the main window, and the floating capture panel can stay on top or shrink to the notification area. You can also schedule automatic captures at set intervals or start and stop recordings with a timer.
Images can be saved in common bitmap and web formats such as JPEG, PNG, GIF, TIFF, BMP, and WebP, as well as PDF. Video recordings are exported as MP4 or WMV, and audio can be saved on its own for narration-only recordings.
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