Maccy
How Long Does Maccy Keep Your Clipboard History? Retention and Size Limits Explained
Quick answer: Maccy keeps clipboard items until the history count limit pushes the oldest unpinned ones out. It does not delete items by age. You set the limit in Settings → Storage; the default is 200 items. Pinned items are exempt, and you can clear history manually or on quit.
What limits does Maccy actually enforce?
Maccy App‘s retention model is count-based, not time-based. The table separates what I’m confident about from what you should check in your own build.
| Limit | How it works | Where to change it |
|---|---|---|
| History size (item count) | When the count is exceeded, the oldest unpinned items are removed. Default is 200. | Settings → Storage → Size |
| Maximum history size | The size control has an upper cap (historically 999 items). | Settings → Storage |
| Age-based expiry | Not a feature as far as I know. Items stay until pushed out by count or cleared. | n/a |
| Per-item size cap | I’m not aware of a documented per-item limit. Very large images or text blocks simply consume more storage and memory. | Use content-type toggles to avoid saving images or files |
| Pinned items | Not counted against normal eviction. They stay until you unpin or delete them. | Pin from the history list |
Why is my old copy gone?
Three things commonly cause it:
- You hit the count limit. If you copy a lot (terminal output, code snippets, web text), 200 items can be a few hours of heavy work. Raise the size in Settings → Storage.
- Clear-on-quit is enabled. Check Settings → Advanced (or General, depending on version) for a “clear history on quit” style option.
- You cleared it. The Clear action in the Maccy menu removes unpinned items. Holding Option typically exposes a “clear all” variant that also removes pinned items.
Why is old content still in my history?
Because nothing expires it. If you copy rarely, items from months ago can sit in the list indefinitely. Two additional behaviors make this feel stickier:
- Duplicates are merged, not repeated. Copying the same content again moves the existing entry back to the top and bumps its copy count rather than adding a new row. This stretches how far back your history reaches.
- Sort order matters. The Storage tab lets you sort by last copy time, first copy time, or number of copies. With “number of copies” sorting, frequently used old items stay near the top.
How should I choose a history size?
| Your habit | Suggested size | Reasoning |
|---|---|---|
| Light use, mostly links and short text | 100-200 | The default covers days of history and keeps the list quick to scan. |
| Developer or writer, constant copying | 500-999 | You’ll search more than scroll, so a bigger buffer costs little. |
| Privacy-first, short memory preferred | 20-50 plus clear on quit | Less sensitive data lingers on disk. |
These are judgment calls, not benchmarks. I haven’t measured performance differences between sizes, and you shouldn’t treat the numbers as tested thresholds.
Can I stop heavy content from bloating storage?
Yes, by controlling what Maccy Mac saves at all. In Settings → Storage, you can choose which content types to keep (text, images, files). If your history feels sluggish or your disk usage is creeping up, turning off image saving is the most effective single change, since screenshots and copied images are far larger than text.
Maccy Clipboard also lets you ignore specific apps, pasteboard types, and regex patterns under Settings → Ignore. That is the right tool for password managers and anything you never want stored, rather than relying on a short history to limit exposure.
Where is the data stored, and does clearing really delete it?
Maccy is local-first: history lives on your Mac, not on a server. It uses a local database inside the app’s data folder, and the exact path depends on how you installed it (App Store builds are sandboxed under ~/Library/Containers/, direct and Homebrew installs use Application Support).
Clearing history removes entries through the app. If you need certainty for sensitive material, also check whether “clear system clipboard” is enabled, because the most recent copy may still be on the macOS pasteboard even after Maccy’s list is empty.
Troubleshooting checklist
- History shorter than expected: raise Size in Settings → Storage.
- History empty after restart: look for a clear-on-quit setting.
- Specific items keep vanishing: pin them.
- Same item not appearing twice: expected, since duplicates are merged.
- Sensitive items showing up: add the source app or pasteboard type to Ignore.
- Laggy list: disable image saving and lower the size.
The bottom line
Maccy’s retention is simple once you stop expecting an expiry timer: a count limit, pinning as your exception, and manual or on-quit clearing for privacy. Set the size to match how much you copy, ignore what shouldn’t be stored, and pin what you can’t lose.
Maccy is free and open source, so if a retention behavior doesn’t match what’s described here, the source and issue tracker are the final word. What do you wish Maccy would let you configure about retention?
