If you handle support, you'll know how frustrating it can be to portray a simple set of commands in a manner that's easily understood by your end user. We've written simple steps,  in plain English, and still, customers can come back confused.

Worse, you ask them to take a screengrab of the error and they have not the slightest idea of how to achieve this or grab the wrong content. It would be far easier if they could record their screen using a free app, so you can see what's going wrong and, then, in turn, record the steps they need yourself and email them across or make available as a download or video stream.

Captura 8 is a free tool which has somewhat surprised us as it's gone unnoticed, yet has been around for a few years. What Captura offers is the ability to capture your screen using various methods. At it's most basic level, Captura will take a shot of your entire screen, an application window or a specified area. Sadly there's no delay option for capturing a screengrab, which is sometimes essential for grabbing an action shot, but it's an excellent screen 

However, it's the video recording of your screen where this program excels. Capture enables you to specify an area, a window you want to record or your entire screen (which could result in some huge video files if you have a 4K or 5K resolution). To reduce the size of the exported files you can change the format of the recorded video (various MP4 formats, WebM, Avi etc), reduce/increase the FPS, the quality of your export and whether you want to record audio.

Captura offers a number of semi-professional recording options such as being able to record your mouse clicks (so the person viewing your video can see your actions) and your keystrokes, so they can see what you did to achieve your goals.

What's new in 8.0.0 (see changelog for more)?

- Major update, see full changelog