When comparing Spectacle vs ShareX, the Slant community recommends ShareX for most people. In the question“What are the best screen capture tools for Windows?” ShareX is ranked 1st while Spectacle is ranked 10th. The most important reason people chose ShareX is:
Designed as file uploader in the first place, ShareX supports overhelming amount of services for you to upload your files to and the list is expanding.
Specs
Ranked in these QuestionsQuestion Ranking
Pros
Pro Free and open source
Spectacle is licensed under MIT with source code available on GitHub.
Pro Simple hotkeys
Spectacle offers easy-to-remember preset hotkeys.
Pro Mouseless
All windows in Spectacle can be controlled with keyboard shortcuts, so no mouse is needed. This makes for a fast way to control windows.
Pro Great UX
Spectacle is easy to use and configure. It's plug and play.
Pro Low footprint
Spectacle only uses up 18-19 MB of RAM, which means there is not much overhead by using this app.
Pro Multi-monitor support
Pro 7+ years of use
Using it for 7 years
Pro Allows uploading to a vast number of different services
Designed as file uploader in the first place, ShareX supports overhelming amount of services for you to upload your files to and the list is expanding.
Pro Free and open source
ShareX is licensed under GPL with source code available on GitHub.
Pro Customizable
You can choose what shortcut key to bind your command to, as well what host it uploads the file to.
Pro Freezes screen when you capture
When you enter a capture mode, the screen content is preserved as it was when you started capturing by default. However there is a special "Light" mode where the screen does not freeze.
Pro Can capture video too
Apart from still images, ShareX allows the user to record unlimited video with all the options available for normal image capture.
Pro Capturing (screen, video, a window, etc.) with annotation + automation
Capturing (screen, video, a window, etc.) with annotation + automation makes for some powerful workflows.
Annotation is key for research on any project size. Capturing screenshots, editing them ("annotating"), converting to a PNG, removing the background to make a transparent version, saving to google drive, creating large+med+sm sizes, uploading thumbnails, is an example of a workflow you could create. The list goes on...
You'll find the same strength & depth in features for image handling also for text, videos, other files by type, and on and on..
Pro Has an editor
It has its own screen editing tool.
Pro It has a dead simple way for creating animated GIFs
It is great for creating software tutorials or highlighting new features in a sales function - nothing beats a well-placed animated GIF in an email.
Cons
Con Not maintained
The software is free, but no longer seems to be maintained.
Con Impossible to add new functions
While keyboard shortcuts can be changed for the available actions, there is no way to add custom actions which in turn limits the functionality of the app.
Con Limited window sizing capabilities
You can use 1/2 of the screen vertically and horizontally (divide into 4 parts). You can also use the screen in thirds too, but only the left and right third: you can't use the 1/3 in the center. There is no way to do a more granular distribution.
Con Breaks on macOS High Sierra / Chrome or Firefox
Doesn't support side by side windows.
Con Doesn't work with any Adobe products
There are some apps like Adobe Reader that do not work with Spectacle. Basically, any app with a heavily customized UI that breaks OS X accessibility will not work correctly under Spectacle.
Con Too complicated
This is extremely customizable, but extremely complex! If you want something simple and intuitive out of the box, stay away from ShareX.
Con Privacy concern
Can upload screenshots to web without you realizing, unable to delete or reverse process.
Con Scrolling window capture doesn't work always as expected
Sometimes might need to use another screen capture software to capture a scrolling page.