Recording

Manual recording writes a long video file from the moment you start until you stop. It is separate from the replay buffer, so you can still save clips while you record.

Set up a hotkey

Clink has no default recording hotkey in 0.4.4. To add one:

Open the hotkeys

Go to the Capture tab and find Hotkeys.

Add a row

Press Add hotkey. The new row's key button reads Press keys.

Choose the keys

Press the keys you want (Esc cancels). Letters, digits and editing keys need Ctrl or Alt. F-keys, PrintScreen, ScrollLock and Pause work alone.

Choose the action

In the row's list, choose Start / stop recording.

To change the keys later, click the row's key button (it reads Not set until you set one), then press the keys.

You can also use Start recording in the tray menu. It becomes Stop recording while you record. From a script or Stream Deck, run Clink.exe --record to start or stop. See Settings.

While you record

A Recording started notification appears, with the game name and how to stop ("Press" your keys "to stop", or "Stop it from the tray menu"). The status dot, if you turned it on, is red.

When you stop, Recording saved shows the length and size.

In the default mode, a recording won't start unless Clink sees a game: "Not recording: waiting for a game". Add your app under Custom apps or switch to Always (whenever Clink runs).

A recording ends when you stop it, when you pause, or (in the default mode) when the game closes. Settings you change while recording apply when it stops.

Where files go

Recordings go to the Recordings folder inside your clips folder, named like Game name 2025-01-31 21-04-05.mp4. If Clink doesn't know the game, the name starts with "Recording". While a recording runs, the file ends in .mp4.rec.

Recordings aren't clips. Share last clip and the trim-last shortcut skip them.

Limits

4 hours per file. At the limit, the file ends and Clink continues in a new file ("Recording continues in a new file").
1 GB of free disk space to start. If there is less, Clink refuses to start. If the disk fills while you record, the file ends with "The disk is nearly full".

If something interrupts it

Display change. Clink restarts capture ("Display changed, restarting capture") and continues in a new part.
Graphics driver reset. Clink shows "The GPU was reset, restarting capture" and retries for up to 3 minutes. If the recorder doesn't come back it stops with "Recording stopped: the recorder did not come back".
Sleep. When Windows wakes, Clink re-reads your monitors and restarts the recorder.
Sign-out or shutdown. Clink finishes the active recording first.
Crash or power loss. The next time Clink starts, it finishes any unfinished recording and adds it to the library. A notification reads "Recovered 1 recording" (or "Recovered N recordings"): what was written is in the Recordings folder.