Clipboard manager for macOS · it's alive

YOU COPY.IT HUNTS.

That spider crawling around this page is SilkNest. On your Mac it lives on the desktop, catches every single thing you copy, and keeps it in its web until you need it again. Go on, feed it.

Install for Mac How it works

Feed the spider

Click a scrap to copy it, or select any text on this page and press ⌘C.

⌘ ⇧ CCatch what's on the clipboard
⌘ ⇧ SpaceClipboard history at your pointer
NHover the spider, press N: open the Nest
⌥ NWrite a Silk Note
01 · Hunt

Copy the way you always do. The spider handles the rest.

With Hunt mode on, every copy is caught on its own: text, links, code, images and files. Copy the same thing again and it moves to the front instead of showing up twice.

Quick Web

Your recent copies open around your pointer.

Press ⌘ ⇧ Space and your last copies spread out on silk around the cursor. Flick toward one to paste it into the app you're using.

  • Each kind looks different: code, links, images, files, plain text
  • Images and files drag straight out into Finder, Slack, anywhere
  • Paste as plain text, or change the case before you paste
Copied items (a file, a code snippet, a link, an error message and a photo) hanging on silk threads around the pointer
Quick Web, open at the pointer
A full-screen spider web over frosted glass, with copied items caught in the threads and the glowing spider at the centre
The Nest, over frosted glass
02 · Nest

Everything you've caught, across your whole screen.

Hover the spider and press N. The screen frosts over and a full web spreads across it, with every catch hanging in its threads. Pin what you want to keep, pull a thread to look closer, drag an item out to use it.

  • Search everything you've copied, including text inside images
  • Paste Stack: line up several copies and paste them in order
  • Works across every display you have plugged in
03 · Silk Notes

Short notes that hang by the edge of your screen.

Press ⌥ N, type a thought, press Return. It hangs as a small silk knot on the side of your screen, out of the way of tabs and toolbars. Hover a knot to read it.

  • Pin a note so it stays at the top
  • Tie a note to one app, so it only shows up while you're in that app
  • Pull the thread to bring a note out, drag along the edge to reorder
04 · Private

It never leaves your Mac.

There's no account, no cloud and no analytics. SilkNest doesn't connect to the internet at all.

AES-GCM · 256-bit

Your clipboard history and notes are encrypted on disk with a key that only your user account can read.

Password managers skipped

Copies from 1Password, Bitwarden and other password managers stay in memory only and are never written to disk.

Left out of backups

The history folder is excluded from Time Machine, and files dragged out of the web are cleaned up.

Install

Let the spider in.

One small app. It lives on your desktop, not in your Dock.

Version
1.0.0
Requires
macOS 14 Sonoma or later · Apple Silicon
Size
1.7 MB
Price
Free
$ curl -fsSL https://silknest.app/install.sh | sh
One line, no security prompts. It checks the download's checksum and signature, installs SilkNest in Applications and opens it.
  1. Open Terminal: press ⌘ Space, type Terminal, press Return.
  2. Paste the line on the left and press Return. SilkNest installs and opens by itself.
  3. To paste straight into apps, allow SilkNest under Accessibility when it asks. Copying works without it.
  4. Copy something. Watch the spider go get it.