How do I find something that was on my screen?

Goal

Turn on screen history and later find what was on screen in the timeline, search, or chat.

Before you start

• The Screen Recording and Accessibility permissions. Setup asks for them. See Which macOS permissions does Nova need?
• Free space on the Mac. The frames take up storage.

Steps

1. Settings, History. The page is also in Simple. On the History card, use the switch Turn on history.
2. Setup, Set up history, walks through Screen recording, Accessibility, and Privacy. Allow opens System Settings. Recording starts only after Done.
3. To open: in the menu at the Nova icon, Open History, or the History shortcut, by default Control-Command-S. History search and History pause have their own shortcuts. All three are under Keyboard shortcuts.
4. History view: the timeline of one day. ⌘← and ⌘→ change the day. A moment shows its recognized text. Copy text puts it on the clipboard. Reopen opens the web page from that moment in your browser or brings the app to the front.
5. Search view: type a term. Filters for time range, app, and kind, such as Frames or Window text. Enter, a double-click, or Show in History jumps to the spot. Reopen in a result row opens the web page or app directly. Also in Nova Search (⌥K) under History.
6. Chat view: ask a question about your recordings. The answer names Sources. A click on a source opens the history at that spot.
7. To pause: in the menu, History: status and pause, for example Pause 15 min or Pause until I resume. Resume records again. The History pause shortcut, by default Control-Command-P, switches between Pause until I resume and Resume. It is shown in the menu next to the item. If macOS cannot assign a shortcut because another app already uses it, it appears grey as taken in the submenu.
8. Settings, History, card Privacy: Excluded apps with Choose app… or Running apps…. Card Storage: Keep for (days), 14 by default, and Keep text when frames are deleted. At the top, Used shows how much space frames and database take right now. A different storage folder applies after Nova restarts.

Example

Open History search, type “invoice number”, choose Yesterday as the time range, and open the hit with Show in History.

Common problems

• With a cloud model, your chat question and the excerpts found go to the provider. Nova says so once per conversation but does not ask. If the source Screen history under Privacy & security, tab Classes & sources, is set to Local model, the chat offers only local models. Privacy Lock blocks this chat with a cloud model but does not stop the recording. For that, use the pause in the menu.
• Skip private windows works with no browser today. To keep a browser out of the history, exclude the whole app under Excluded apps.
• If less space is free than Keep free at least (GB), the history pauses the frames. After the retention period it deletes older frames. Without Keep text when frames are deleted, the text is gone too.
• In Nova the history records no sound, neither the microphone nor system audio. For conversations, see How do I record a meeting?
• The history records continuously. To keep one moment on purpose, use Moments, see How do I keep a moment from the screen? Copying text from a rectangle is in How do I read text off the screen or have a crop explained?
• While the Local History app is running, it records and Nova shows its recordings in the history. Nova does not record on its own meanwhile. The menu then shows “Local History is recording”.