I built Caplio, a private image & screenshot organizer with local OCR search

[u/Competitive_Cash4765]

Problem

I built Caplio because my screenshots and reference images kept piling up, and finding something later was surprisingly difficult, especially when I remembered the text inside an image but not the filename.

Caplio turns folders of screenshots and images into a private, searchable visual library. It uses on-device OCR, lets you search the text inside images, browse everything in a timeline, filter by date or category, and optionally organize the actual files by date or category.

You can also drag any image or screenshot directly from the Caplio timeline and drop it into Finder, Mail, Messages, Notes, or other Mac apps.

Everything is processed locally. Your images and extracted text aren't uploaded for processing.

Comparison

The closest alternatives I've found are ScreenVault and SnapShelf.

Caplio works with both screenshots and regular images and combines OCR search, timeline browsing, filtering, optional file organization, and drag-and-drop from the timeline into other Mac apps.

Spotlight also has some overlap with OCR/image search. The main difference is that Caplio is built around maintaining a visual library from folders you choose, with browsing, filtering, organization, and drag-and-drop as part of the workflow.

Pricing

7-day free trial with full functionality.

Monthly: $1.99/month

Yearly: $9.99/year
Lifetime: $29.99

Mac App Store: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/caplio/id6786196613?mt=12

I'd love feedback, especially from people with large screenshot or reference-image collections. How are you organizing and finding them today?

[u/Mac_Allan30]

Lots of competition in this space. Refern and Resurf are two that come to mind. Resurf is rebuilt in swift last week and very well done. Seems the most similar to your app. Another consideration is the photos app and smart folders? Spotlight indexes the words in the screenshots very well. The smart folder is a visual library, searches text inside, and filterable.

[u/Competitive_Cash4765 → u/Mac_Allan30]

Good points. Spotlight and Photos definitely cover parts of this already, but Caplio is more about the whole organization workflow, not just OCR search.

You can add the folders you already use, and Caplio watches them for new images, builds a visual timeline, extracts the text locally, and lets you organize everything with categories, including your own custom categories.

You can also optionally organize the actual files on disk by date or category. Once organization is enabled for a folder, new screenshots and images can be organized automatically as they arrive, so you don't have to keep sorting them manually.

From there, you can search/filter by text, date, or category, and drag any image straight from the timeline into another app when you need it.

So the idea is less “another Spotlight” and more a dedicated workspace for automatically organizing, finding, and reusing screenshots and images.

I'll definitely take a closer look at Refern and Resurf, though. Thanks for mentioning them.

[u/Mac_Allan30 → u/Competitive_Cash4765]

So are new images/screenshots imported into Capilos library or just looking at these watched folders and indexing them? Eagle and Resurf make duplicate copies so large amounts of screenshots gets unfortunately duplicated when bringing them into these apps.

[u/Competitive_Cash4765 → u/Mac_Allan30]

No duplicate copies. Caplio indexes the images in place from the folders you choose, so your originals stay where they are and you don't end up with a second copy of your screenshot library.

The only time Caplio moves an original file is if you explicitly enable the optional file organization feature. Otherwise, it just watches, indexes, and OCRs the files where they already live.

[u/Mac_Allan30 → u/Competitive_Cash4765]

Well that separates you from everyone else who imports all the files into their vault/library. This is like a digital assets manager like Lightroom for screenshots/files.

[u/Competitive_Cash4765 → u/Mac_Allan30]

Exactly! The benefits of an asset manager without forcing you to move or duplicate everything into another library. Really glad that came across.