AIShot

One hotkey: screenshot → straight into the AI app you're talking to.
No Finder digging · no drag & drop · no resident process

한국어

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Press a hotkey → drag a region (or hit Space for a window, Esc to cancel) → the PNG is saved into your usual screenshot folder and lands in the app that was frontmost when you pressed the hotkey:

Frontmost app	What gets pasted	Why
Terminals & IDEs — Ghostty, Terminal, iTerm2, kitty, WezTerm, Warp, VS Code, Antigravity, Cursor	escaped file path + auto ⌘V	CLI agents (Claude Code, Codex CLI) read images from a path — same format as drag & drop
AI apps & browsers — Claude, Codex, ChatGPT, Gemini, Safari, Chrome	the PNG itself + auto ⌘V	attaches as an image in the chat input
Anything else	clipboard only, no keystroke	never pastes into the wrong place — hit ⌘V yourself wherever you want

Every capture is also saved as a file with the native macOS naming (Screenshot 2026-07-08 at 11.09.27 AM.png), so pasting and archiving happen in one motion.

No setup needed: AIShot saves to the same folder macOS uses for ⌘⇧3/4/5 screenshots. If you've moved that folder (System Settings / defaults write com.apple.screencapture location), AIShot follows automatically. You only ever configure something if you want AIShot captures in a different folder than regular screenshots — run the built-in folder chooser once:

open -na AIShot --args --choose-dir

Full resolution order: --out DIR flag → the app's own folder (set by --choose-dir, or defaults write com.techjuicelab.aishot saveDir ...) → the system screenshot folder → ~/Desktop (the macOS stock default).

AIShot runs only while invoked — it captures, pastes, and exits. No menu bar item, no daemon, zero idle footprint.

Install

Requires macOS 14 or later (Apple Silicon or Intel).

Build from source (requires Xcode Command Line Tools) — recommended, no Gatekeeper friction:

git clone https://github.com/techjuicelab/aishot.git
cd aishot && ./build.sh   # builds, signs (ad-hoc), installs to ~/Applications

Or download AIShot.app.zip from Releases and unzip into ~/Applications. The app is not notarized, so macOS quarantines the download — clear it with

xattr -dr com.apple.quarantine ~/Applications/AIShot.app

or launch it once and approve it under System Settings → Privacy & Security → "Open Anyway" (on macOS 15+ right-click → Open no longer bypasses this).

Hotkey

Bind any launcher you already use to:

open -gn "$HOME/Applications/AIShot.app"

• Karabiner-Elements:

  mkdir -p ~/.config/karabiner/assets/complex_modifications
  cp karabiner/aishot.json ~/.config/karabiner/assets/complex_modifications/

  then enable the "AIShot" rule in Karabiner-Elements → Complex Modifications → Add predefined rule. Ships as ⌘⇧2 — right next to the system's ⌘⇧3/4/5 screenshot family.

• Alfred / Raycast / Shortcuts.app: point a hotkey at the same open command.

First-run permissions (one-time)

1. First hotkey press → Screen Recording prompt appears and the app exits (System Settings → Privacy & Security → Screen & System Audio Recording → allow AIShot).
2. Press again → capture UI appears. On save, a Files and Folders prompt may appear for your screenshot folder (iCloud Drive / Desktop) — allow it, or nothing can be saved.
3. After the first completed capture → Accessibility prompt (for the synthesized ⌘V). Until granted, AIShot still copies to the clipboard; once granted, pasting is automatic from the next shot on.

Rebuild caveat: the app is ad-hoc signed, so rebuilding changes its code hash and silently invalidates existing TCC grants — System Settings still shows the toggles ON, but captures come back as wallpaper-only. build.sh therefore runs tccutil reset All com.techjuicelab.aishot after installing, so the next launch re-prompts cleanly. If you rebuild often, create a self-signed code-signing certificate once (Keychain Access → Certificate Assistant) and change the codesign line — grants then survive rebuilds.

Flags

open -gn "$HOME/Applications/AIShot.app" --args --mode image

Flag	Description	Default
--mode auto|path|image	force the paste format instead of auto-detecting	auto
--out DIR	destination folder (this run only)	see save-location order above
--choose-dir	open a folder picker and save the choice as the app's default	—
--no-paste	copy to clipboard only, never synthesize ⌘V	—
--timeout SEC	how long the selection UI may wait	300
--self-test	print folder / frontmost app / permission state and exit	—

Customize

Add apps to either category without rebuilding — AIShot reads two defaults arrays at launch:

# find an app's bundle ID
osascript -e 'id of app "SomeTerm"'

defaults write com.techjuicelab.aishot extraPathApps  -array-add "com.example.someterm"
defaults write com.techjuicelab.aishot extraImageApps -array-add "com.example.chatapp"

Or edit pathPasteIDs / imagePasteIDs at the top of main.swift and re-run ./build.sh.

Uninstall

rm -rf ~/Applications/AIShot.app
tccutil reset All com.techjuicelab.aishot
defaults delete com.techjuicelab.aishot 2>/dev/null
# and remove the hotkey rule from your launcher / Karabiner

Log: /tmp/aishot.log

License

MIT © TechJuiceLab