Steam Game Recorder vs. Medal: Which is Better for Clipping PC Games?

Steam Game Recording and Medal are two of the most prominent PC clipping and recording tools available today. While both provide essential recording capabilities, let's look at some pros and cons, break down how they compare, and ultimately decide which is the better fit for you.

Game recording

• Steam: Offers background recording, full session recording, and manual clipping for Steam games. Users can set up hotkeys to save the last few seconds or minutes of gameplay, and developers can integrate auto-clipping for in-game events.
• Medal: Same as Steam, with added flexibility to clip and upload any PC game up to 10 minutes of footage (or 30 minutes with Premium).

Audio & editing

• Steam: Merges all audio sources, which means PC/game audio, voice chat (like Discord), and microphone inputs are combined into a single audio track. This makes post-editing more difficult, as you can’t separate voice from game sound.
• Medal: Supports split audio tracks, allowing users to edit, mute, boost, and balance their microphone and PC/game audio separately.

Game compatibility

• Steam: Can only record games launched through Steam, meaning any non-Steam games or general desktop activity are excluded.
• Medal: Records any PC game and can even record entire screens, making it more versatile for those who play across multiple platforms.

Sharing, storage, and community

• Steam: Clips are primarily stored locally, and users can share them through Steam chat or manually upload them elsewhere.
• Medal: Offers instant uploading and sharing to Medal, Discord, Twitter, and YouTube with built-in cloud storage for accessing and managing clips from multiple devices (and saving disk space). Your game clips can live on your Medal profile and in the cloud instead of your hard drive.

If you just need a basic recording tool and play games exclusively on Steam, Steam’s built-in recorder is likely enough. If you want longer clips, audio control, to record non-Steam games, quick share, and more disk space, Medal is your best bet with more flexibility and editing features.

TLDR: For casual players, Steam's recorder is convenient for Steam games, but Medal is the better choice for recording clips from any PC game for quick sharing and more.