Home / Games / PlayClaw 5 - Game Recording and Streaming
PlayClaw 5 - Game Recording and Streaming
The amazing PlayClaw video capture tool gives customers incredible power!PlayClaw has been designed to make full use of multi-core processors and hardware accelerated H.264 codecs, which ensures the outstanding quality of the output with a minimal impact on system performance.
What players say
Steam review score and the most-helpful voices, which may include critical ones. Score via Steam as of 2026-08-31 · quoted reviews as of 2026-05-13.
What reviewers agree on
38 of the 96 reviews raise this.
“Much better than Fraps: 1) compress video in real time 2) small size of video files 3) good interface and simple settings”
“I love this software Tons of bells and whistles , make a regular recorder look like crap, use this for YouTube , its very light and way more options and settings (but not scary and user frendly ) than those out there on…”
“This software will allow you to record in-game and include overlays such as footage from your webcam, teamspeak data and other customizable information. It also includes the ability to record the desktop. Other screen…”
29 of the 96 reviews raise this.
“The first few days I used Playclaw everything worked fine, I was able to record for more than an hour in 1080p without much lag or frame drops... Then things started to get messy when I tried it on various games and…”
“as a noob youtube playthrough person i enjoy using this software. Its so CPU and RAM light even though its packed with so much. 10/10 I dare anyone not to like this. Files are saved as AVI but compressed in MJPEG…”
“I love this software Tons of bells and whistles , make a regular recorder look like crap, use this for YouTube , its very light and way more options and settings (but not scary and user frendly ) than those out there on…”
6 of the 96 reviews raise this.
“I have to say, that all things considered: Playclaw is an amazing product and was definitely worth every penny. When I bought it originally, it was simpy a game recorded. It has evovled and it can do everything I need…”
“This is one of the best game capture programs out there, and is definitely worth $40.00. I constantly use it for my YouTube channel, and it hasn't failed me yet. I would purchase it over again.”
“This is a great software for playing games, it's easy to use, simple interface, online manual is informtive and the comunity support for this software is vast. It is a very big help to those that want to start doing…”
6 of the 96 reviews raise this.
“Legit work in progress! Now that streaming has been implemented and released into the retail PlayClaw there will be much more improvements etc.. This Dev or Dev team is very active in the steam community forums and is…”
“Just wanted to give a shout out to PlayClaw and the Developr Team! They do such a good job and keep updating their product, keep in touch with the community. With a Fantastic Product - I Highly Reccommend PlayClaw to…”
“For such a simple program, this thing works GREAT! Every once in a while something updates and breaks compatibility but they seem to be quick about fixing it or it ends up being an issue with the drivers I updated and…”
3 of the 96 reviews raise this.
“this programm is broken it crashes every game i used the h. 264 codec but its not working do´nt buy this !!! Edit!!!: bug is gone i don´t know why but its doing well at the moment”
“I've used PlayClaw 5 to take thousands of images and videos over many years now. It's probably not too far from being a decade. I don't use much of the bells and whistles, but it's always worked great for my purposes.”
“This is the most reliable game recorder that I have ever used. I tried out several like FRAPS, Dxtory, Bandicam, and even free ones like xfire. Out of every one that I've used this program was the best to use out of all…”
44 of the 96 reviews raise this · 19 of them still recommend the game.
“The first few days I used Playclaw everything worked fine, I was able to record for more than an hour in 1080p without much lag or frame drops... Then things started to get messy when I tried it on various games and…”
“At first I was very happy witht his software; it captures video quite well with few dropped frames. After I tried to do anything more than capture gameplay this software gave me nothing but problems. I had issues with…”
“Has not worked since i purchased it. I waited for the developer to update it which they did about a month later which broke more things. I went to Vavle for a refund since it is broken showing my post on the forum when…”
11 of the 96 reviews raise this · 2 of them still recommend the game.
“The first few days I used Playclaw everything worked fine, I was able to record for more than an hour in 1080p without much lag or frame drops... Then things started to get messy when I tried it on various games and…”
“While the program works well and is feature-rich (coming from Fraps), the Steam version is a pain in the ass. Buy the non-Steam version instead and save a few bucks too.”
“Has not worked since i purchased it. I waited for the developer to update it which they did about a month later which broke more things. I went to Vavle for a refund since it is broken showing my post on the forum when…”
11 of the 96 reviews raise this · 2 of them still recommend the game.
“The first few days I used Playclaw everything worked fine, I was able to record for more than an hour in 1080p without much lag or frame drops... Then things started to get messy when I tried it on various games and…”
“At first I was very happy witht his software; it captures video quite well with few dropped frames. After I tried to do anything more than capture gameplay this software gave me nothing but problems. I had issues with…”
“Heavily disappointed with it. I was looking more for the pre-recording feature (which is an absolute desaster in this application) but I tested both the recording and pre-recording feature. If you get a slight spike in…”
9 of the 96 reviews raise this · 1 of them still recommend the game.
“Has not worked since i purchased it. I waited for the developer to update it which they did about a month later which broke more things. I went to Vavle for a refund since it is broken showing my post on the forum when…”
“When I first got this it was working fine for recording Let's Plays with face cam. However, with each update, it seems to have gotten worse and worse for me & my set up of hard- & software. It started with audio & video…”
“as much as it works.. i cannot reccomend it. the software lags with voice and volume after a certain time and getting good quality is rather hard with various games. and the dev has not updated to fix the lag... ever.…”
8 of the 96 reviews raise this · 3 of them still recommend the game.
“At first I was very happy witht his software; it captures video quite well with few dropped frames. After I tried to do anything more than capture gameplay this software gave me nothing but problems. I had issues with…”
“When I first got this it was working fine for recording Let's Plays with face cam. However, with each update, it seems to have gotten worse and worse for me & my set up of hard- & software. It started with audio & video…”
“I liked the software at first but started having issues with audio sync being off, and it would be okay if it was just out of sync but it is sections of audio that are behind; I'd have to cut and sync audio after…”
Counted across 96 English reviews, sampled to match this game's 70.9% positive rating · as of 2026-05-13
“The marketplace for screen capture tools is starting to get quite crowded, but PlayClaw stands out as it strikes a great balance between ease of use and quality. The main competitors are Bandicam, Fraps, and Dxtory. PlayClaw beats Fraps as it is much less resources intensive,…”
— a player, Steam review · 12 hrs played“I have been using this program for many years! And I am 100% satisfied with it even now! When you play your favorite video games and want to capture a good moment, then you need a simple program to capture video and then post it to YouTube! This program will give you high…”
— a player, Steam review · 826 hrs played“I have mixed feelings on this one. tl;dr I ended up buying Fraps to get my game captures. About me: I make a lot of fragshow/machinima movies and have about 10 years experience. This program didn't work out so well for that purpose. I also did some research on YouTube for…”
— a player, Steam review · 1 hrs playedAchievement stats
Global completion rates across all Steam players — a data view of how far people actually get. Source: Steam official stats · as of 2026-09-19.
Price tracking
US-region pricing (USD), sampled twice daily by our own tracker since 2026-08-12. Steam prices vary by region — always confirm your local price on Steam.
Regional prices at last sample, in local currency — Steam sets each region's price independently.
Cheapest → most expensive, converted to USD at ECB reference rates (2026-09-25). Relative comparison only.
Latest official news
Developer announcements via the Steam news API — links go to the original posts. More across all games on the news hub.
Software fix for latest nvidia drivers
Build #3709 has fixed problem with starting nvencoder after installing the latest nvidia geforce drivers.
PlayClaw 6 is released
We're glad to inform you that we have just released this major update for v5 ːsteamhappyː If you already has v5 (steam license) then you'll be able to get v6 steam license from this bundle with great
PlayClaw 6 is released
We're glad to inform you that we have just released this major update for v5 ːsteamhappyː If you already has v5 (steam license) then you'll be able to get v6 steam license from this bundle with great
First PlayClaw 6 beta
We worked hard to prepare this major update. Or, may be, almost new software - PlayClaw 6. We've changed the core of our software a bit. Overlays are the very important thing, other features are just
First PlayClaw 6 beta
We worked hard to prepare this major update. Or, may be, almost new software - PlayClaw 6. We've changed the core of our software a bit. Overlays are the very important thing, other features are just
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Screenshots
Official Steam store screenshots — click any shot to enlarge.
Facts & details
From the Steam store record, snapshot 2026-05-13.
| Genres | Audio Production, Software Training, Utilities, Video Production |
| Player tags | Utilities · Video Production · Audio Production · Software Training · Software (SteamSpy community voting) |
| Features | Steam Achievements |
| Languages | English, Russian, French, Hungarian, Polish, Portuguese - Brazil, Korean, Simplified Chinese, Traditional Chinese |
| Achievements | 10 |
| Official site | http://www.playclaw.com |
Minimum system requirements (PC)
Minimum: OS *: Windows 7 Processor: 2-cores CPU with SSE support Memory: 1 GB RAM Graphics: Intel/AMD/NVidia graphics card DirectX: Version 8.0 Additional Notes: Administrator rights to run software are mandatory.