Deck: a local-first clipboard manager for macOS that is not shipping right now
Deck is a modern, native, privacy-first clipboard manager for macOS.
At a glance
- What is it?
- Deck records clipboard history, encrypts LAN sharing, and runs on-device search, but its own README tells users to stop downloading and stop using in-app auto update. Here is what the repository actually documents, and who should wait.
- Who is it for?
- Deck is worth adopting only if you already have a working installed copy or you are willing to build from source and accept an unnotarized binary; anyone who needs a supported download path should wait until the README's temporary notice is removed.
- Can I use it commercially?
- Check first. The repository uses a licence we do not classify automatically, so read its LICENSE file before any commercial use.
- Is it still maintained?
- Yes. The repository last received commits 129 days ago.
- What is it written in?
- Mainly Swift, according to GitHub's language statistics.
Answers come from the project's GitHub data, last synced on September 15, 2026, and from our analysis. They are not legal advice.
DEEP OPEN-SOURCE ANALYSIS
The problem Deck targets: clipboard history that never leaves the Mac
macOS keeps exactly one clipboard item. Copy a second thing and the first is gone. The usual fix is a background utility that records everything you copy and lets you search it later. The catch is that most of those utilities either want a subscription, a cloud account, or both. Deck's pitch is that the history stays on the machine: the README states "Local-first, your data stays on your Mac by default," and the usage statistics are described as computed locally and never uploaded. The audience is macOS 14+ users who copy a lot of structured material (code, links, colors, files, rich text) and who are not comfortable handing that stream to a hosted service. The repository lists text, images, files, colors, links and rich text as captured types, which puts it in the same bracket as long-running clipboard utilities rather than a snippet expander. The privacy features go past storage: Touch ID or Face ID gate the panel, sensitive data filtering uses the Luhn algorithm to detect bank card and identity or passport numbers and skip capture, and window-aware protection pauses capture when it detects sensitive window titles such as password fields or login pages. That last one is a heuristic on window titles, not a guarantee, and the README does not describe how it decides.
How capture, search and sync fit together
The architecture visible in the material is a native Swift and SwiftUI app with an on-device index. The README names NLEmbedding as the engine behind semantic search, which is Apple's Natural Language framework, so the embedding step runs locally rather than against a remote endpoint. Search supports keyword, regex, and type filters, plus slash-triggered rules that filter by app, date or type with include and exclude and multi-value matching. Ordering is context-aware: items are sorted by relevance to the currently focused app, so the same history surfaces different results depending on where you are. Capture is augmented in two directions. OCR runs in the background through the Vision framework and extracts text from images in multiple languages, which means an image you copy becomes searchable by its contents. IDE Source Anchor watches copies from VS Code, Xcode, JetBrains, Cursor and Windsurf and attaches file path plus line number, so a stored item can jump back to the source location. Sync is deliberately narrow: LAN Sharing with AES-GCM encryption and TOTP verification, plus a Direct IP Connection option for peers when VPN or Bonjour discovery fails. There is no documented cloud relay. Data flow therefore stays inside the local network, and the threat model is whatever your LAN is.
Getting it running: Homebrew, quarantine, and the Accessibility grant
The README gives two install paths. The Homebrew route is three commands: brew tap yuzeguitarist/deck, then export HOMEBREW_CASK_OPTS="--no-quarantine", then brew install --cask deckclip. The README explains that the environment variable disables macOS quarantine for the cask because Deck is not yet notarized. The manual route is to download the latest .dmg from Releases, drag Deck.app into Applications, and grant Accessibility (and Input Monitoring if prompted) under System Settings, Privacy & Security. First launch on an unnotarized app triggers the standard "Apple cannot check it for malicious software" block, and the documented fix is to open System Settings, Privacy & Security, scroll to the blocked message for Deck, and click Open Anyway. Once running, Cmd + P opens the panel, arrow keys navigate, Enter pastes, Shift + Enter pastes as plain text, Cmd + Number quick-pastes items 1 through 9, Option + Q toggles queue mode, Space toggles preview, and Esc closes. Typing immediately after opening starts a search. Auto updates check daily by default, with a manual check in Settings.
The install warning is the first thing you have to read
The README opens its install section with a temporary notice: do not download or update Deck right now, keep using an installed version if it still works, and do not use in-app auto update until further notice. A later paragraph repeats it as a "temporary exception" and says new downloads or updates may still fail because of a current packaging issue. This is the single most important fact about the project as of the last push on 2026-05-09, which is also the date of release v1.4.5. The repository is not archived and releases are recent, so the project is active, but the distribution channel is in a state the maintainer is warning about. Anyone evaluating Deck for a team should treat the Homebrew cask and the auto-update mechanism as unavailable until that notice is removed. The README also states that source code is public for reference only and directs users to the official compiled app from Releases, which sits awkwardly next to the instruction not to download it.
The licence is split, and the split is under-specified
The repository's licence field reads NOASSERTION, while the README badge says "AGPL v3 for deckclip; ARR for rest." Those two signals do not agree, and the material does not include a licence file that resolves which directories fall under AGPL v3 and which fall under all rights reserved. ARR means you do not get redistribution or derivative rights for that portion by default, so the practical question for anyone planning to fork or bundle Deck is which files they are allowed to touch. The README's own line, "Source code is public for reference only," points in the same direction: readable, not necessarily reusable. This is not a legal opinion and I am not giving one. It is a statement that the licence situation cannot be settled from the supplied material, and that a team with a compliance process should read the actual licence file in the repository before doing anything with the source.
Where Deck is the wrong tool
Deck requires macOS 14.0 or later and is macOS-only, so it does nothing for a mixed Windows and Linux team and nothing for anyone pinned to an older Mac. The Accessibility and Input Monitoring permissions are not optional decorations: a clipboard manager that pastes on your behalf needs them, and on managed corporate machines those grants are often blocked by policy. The privacy features have edges worth naming. Window-aware protection keys off window titles, so an app that does not set a meaningful title, or a password field inside a window with a generic title, may not trigger the pause. Sensitive data filtering covers bank card and identity or passport numbers via Luhn; it does not claim to catch API keys, tokens or passwords in free text, even though the README separately lists JWT token detection under smart text detection. LAN sharing uses TOTP verification and AES-GCM, but the material does not describe key exchange or how peers are authenticated beyond that, so the security of a shared history depends on details the README does not give. And the current packaging problem means a new user may simply be unable to install it at all.
Maccy and Paste are the obvious comparisons, and they differ in kind
Maccy is the closest open source reference point: a lightweight, keyboard-driven macOS clipboard history tool, and Deck's README lists it as a migration source alongside Paste and CopyClip. The difference in approach is scope. Maccy is a history list with search; Deck adds an embedding index for semantic search, background OCR through Vision, JavaScript script plugins for Smart Rules, a template library, text transformations such as JSON format and minify, Base64, URL encode and decode, MD5 hash, and line sort and dedup, plus LAN sync with encryption. Paste is the commercial subscription option, which puts history in a paid product with its own sync; Deck's answer to that is local storage plus encrypted LAN transfer rather than a hosted account. If you want a small utility that does one thing and you never think about it again, Maccy is the smaller commitment. If you want the extra machinery (OCR, semantic search, scripted rules, source anchors) and you accept an unnotarized app and a paused release channel, Deck is the one that has it. The other integration named in the repository is Deck × Orbit, a separate radial app switcher and file hub from the same author, which is a companion rather than an alternative.
Maintenance cost and what to verify before you commit
Release cadence looks steady: v1.4.3 on 2026-04-26, v1.4.4 on 2026-05-05, v1.4.5 on 2026-05-09, with release names drawn from Latin ("herculean," "perlīmātus," "Intermicāns"). That is a maintainer shipping frequently. The cost side is the notarization gap. Because the app is not notarized through Apple's paid Developer Program, every install depends on either the HOMEBREW_CASK_OPTS="--no-quarantine" override or the manual Open Anyway click, and every macOS update is a chance for that flow to break again. Auto update checks daily, which is convenient when it works and is exactly the mechanism the README currently tells you to avoid. The CLI Bridge is documented as a way to drive Deck from the terminal for local automation, but the README does not list its subcommands, so that surface has to be learned from the docs site at deckclip.app. Before adopting: confirm the temporary notice is gone, confirm the cask installs without the quarantine override, read the licence file to find where AGPL v3 ends and ARR begins, and decide whether you can live with a tool whose paste action requires Accessibility permission on every machine you deploy it to.
Editorial conclusion
Deck is worth adopting only if you already have a working installed copy or you are willing to build from source and accept an unnotarized binary; anyone who needs a supported download path should wait until the README's temporary notice is removed. Before installing, verify three things: that the notice is gone, that the cask installs without the HOMEBREW_CASK_OPTS="--no-quarantine" workaround, and that the licence file defines what AGPL v3 covers versus what the ARR portion restricts.
Community notes