Wreath

Important

Windows is the focus. The Windows build is where the work happens and where every release is tested: capture, tray, clip library, trimming, settings and the signed-in-progress installer are complete there.

Linux works, its frontend does not. The recorder, wreathctl and capture on Hyprland and KDE are in daily use, but the GTK4 window is unfinished and stays that way while the focus is on Windows. Drive Wreath from wreathctl and a desktop shortcut there, and treat the window as a preview.

Wreath is young on both platforms. It works on the hardware it has been tested on, and each release covers a little more of it. If a session is irreplaceable, keep a second recorder running as well.

Wreath sits in the background and remembers the last half minute. When something worth keeping happens, you press one key and it writes the clip. Nothing is uploaded, there is no account, and the recording never leaves your machine.

It runs on Windows 10 and 11, and on Arch-based Linux.

Download for Windows · Install on Linux · Documentation · Report an issue

What it does

The replay lives in memory as finished, hardware-encoded video and never touches the disk until you ask for it. That is the entire design, and most of the decisions below follow from it.

• GPU encoding only — AMD, Intel and NVIDIA. There is no CPU fallback: if the GPU cannot encode, Wreath says so instead of quietly burning a core.
• H.264, HEVC or AV1, up to 60 fps. Higher frame rates dropped frames and doubled file size at the resolutions people actually record at, so 60 is the ceiling rather than a starting point.
• Replay length from 5 seconds to 10 minutes, inside a memory ceiling you set: 128 MB by default, 32 to 512 MB allowed. The recorder holds that budget whatever you record — a replay that does not fit is trimmed at its start, and the log names the seconds the ceiling holds instead of leaving you guessing.
• Desktop sound and your microphone in one audio track, each with its own level — the two levels set the balance. You choose which playback device the desktop side is captured from, so it does not follow Windows around when the default output changes.
• A clip library with search, collections, rename, playback and trimming. Cuts land on a keyframe and copy the streams, so trimming does not re-encode unless the cut point leaves no choice.
• Native, on both platforms. The Windows interface is Direct2D and DirectWrite and covers the whole product. The Linux recorder is a small background service with a separate GTK4 window; that window is still unfinished, so wreathctl is what covers the parts it is missing. No Electron, no browser engine, no telemetry, no upload client.

Footprint

Same machine, same Windows 11 Task Manager, both applications idle in the background:

Task Manager reading	Medal (7 processes)	Wreath recorder	Difference
Memory	426.8 MB	186.8 MB	−240.0 MB / −56%
CPU	0.0%	0.4%	+0.4 points
Disk	0 MB/s	0.1 MB/s	+0.1 MB/s
Network	0.1 Mbit/s	0 Mbit/s	−0.1 Mbit/s

Medal is grouped as seven processes; the Wreath figure is its recorder. This is a snapshot, not a benchmark — numbers move with replay length, codec, resolution, drivers, and whether a library window is open. The raw readings are here so you can check it yourself rather than take the claim on faith.

Windows

Install

1. Open the latest release.
2. Download Wreath-<version>-x64-setup.exe.
3. Run it as your normal user. The setup needs no administrator rights.
4. Start Wreath from the Start menu and confirm the Windows prompt.

The installer is not code-signed yet, so SmartScreen will warn about it. Only download it from the release page linked above. Every release ships a matching Wreath-<version>-x64-build.json with SHA-256 hashes and the build's evidence.

Everything installs per user under %LOCALAPPDATA%\Wreath. Wreath runs with administrator rights: Windows hands a global shortcut to nothing below the elevated window of a game with an anti-cheat, so without them the replay key would be dead in exactly the games it exists for. Starting with Windows is optional, lives in the tray menu, and registers a logon task that skips the prompt.

Your first replay

1. In Settings, pick the display you want to record.
2. Set the replay length, frame rate, codec, quality and audio.
3. Wait for the home page to say Capture ready.
4. Press Ctrl+Alt+R.
5. Open Library to watch, rename, sort, trim or delete it.

Closing the window does not stop recording. The tray process and the recorder keep going until you quit from the tray menu.

wreathctl

wreathctl.exe is installed next to Wreath and talks to the running recorder, so you never have to edit TOML by hand:

wreathctl status
wreathctl monitors
wreathctl microphones
wreathctl outputs
wreathctl codecs
wreathctl config duration 30
wreathctl config memory 128
wreathctl config codec h264
wreathctl config microphone default
wreathctl config desktop-device default

The full command set, the log format and the diagnostics live in Windows internals, diagnostics, and native builds.

Linux (Arch / CachyOS)

The installer targets Arch and Arch-based distributions. Hyprland and KDE Plasma are the desktops that get tested. The recorder is complete here; the GTK4 window is not, so everything below drives Wreath through wreathctl and a desktop shortcut.

Run it as your normal desktop user — not through sudo:

sudo pacman -S --needed git
git clone https://github.com/mika2go/Wreath.git wreath
cd wreath
./scripts/install-arch.sh --install-deps

The script uses sudo only for packages and for files under /usr. It builds the locked workspace, runs the tests, installs Wreath and enables the wreathd.service user unit. Your existing Wreath, Hyprland, Quickshell and KDE configuration is left alone.

Check that it came up:

wreathctl doctor
wreathctl monitors
systemctl --user status wreathd.service

On Hyprland the Super+Shift+R shortcut is registered at runtime. On KDE Plasma and elsewhere, bind a global shortcut to:

/usr/bin/wreathctl save

Packages, GPU drivers, portals, desktop shortcuts and manual builds are covered in the Linux installation guide.

What's supported

Platform	Capture backend	Replay shortcut	Status
Windows 10 / 11	Windows Graphics Capture, D3D11, Media Foundation, WASAPI	Native Ctrl+Alt+R	Focus platform
Hyprland / Wayland	GPU Screen Recorder, direct monitor or portal	Registered automatically	Primary Linux target
KDE Plasma / Wayland	GPU Screen Recorder, direct monitor or portal	Set up in Plasma	Tested
KDE Plasma / X11	GPU Screen Recorder, direct monitor	Set up in Plasma	Tested
Other Linux desktops	Recorder-discovered target or desktop portal	Set up in the desktop	Best effort

The Linux rows describe the recorder, which is what carries capture there. The Linux interface is a separate matter: it is unfinished, and wreathctl covers what it does not do yet.

Where your data lives

No accounts, no telemetry, no ads, no cloud sync, no upload client. The Linux service is packaged without network access at all.

	Windows	Linux
Configuration	%LOCALAPPDATA%\Wreath\config.toml	$XDG_CONFIG_HOME/wreath/config.toml
Clips	%USERPROFILE%\Videos\Wreath	$HOME/Videos/Wreath
Logs	%LOCALAPPDATA%\Wreath\wreath.log	journalctl --user -u wreathd.service
Control endpoint	\\.\pipe\wreath	$XDG_RUNTIME_DIR/wreath.sock

Uninstalling removes the application and deliberately leaves your clips and configuration where they are.

When something breaks

On Windows, %LOCALAPPDATA%\Wreath\wreath.log is the first place to look — it records which display, encoder, GPU and audio endpoints were picked, and a health line every ten seconds with packet counts and clock drift. wreathctl status shows the same selection at a glance. After reconnecting a monitor or waking from sleep, use Reload settings; if capture stays unavailable, quit from the tray and start again.

On Linux:

wreathctl doctor
wreathctl monitors
journalctl --user -u wreathd.service -b
gpu-screen-recorder --info

If wreathctl save writes a clip but your shortcut does not, the recorder is fine and only the desktop binding needs fixing.

Building it yourself

You need Rust 1.85 or newer plus the platform dependencies from the install guides.

cargo fmt --all -- --check
cargo test --locked --workspace
cargo clippy --locked --workspace --all-targets -- -D warnings
cargo build --locked --workspace

Package	What it is
wreath-core	Shared configuration, protocol, replay buffer and trimming
wreathd	The background recorder
wreathctl	Control and diagnostics client
wreath-ui	Linux GTK4 application
wreath-windows	Windows capture and encoding backend
wreath-win-ui	Windows application and tray

Further reading: architecture, Linux install, Windows build and diagnostics, Windows performance, Windows 11 VM testing.

License

MIT.

Thanks

Nev tested the Windows builds and found most of the audio and clipping bugs that got fixed along the way.