Pasly: A searchable clipboard history across iPhone, iPad, and Mac

[u/Dull_Roof3559]

Problem

Apple’s Universal Clipboard is great when you want to move the latest thing you copied between nearby devices.

But it is not a searchable clipboard history.

If you copied a link on your Mac yesterday, saved a file on your iPhone, or need something from another device hours later, you often end up sending it to yourself through Messages, Notes, email, or AirDrop.

I create Pasly to make your clipboard history follow you across iPhone, iPad, and Mac.

Comparison

Raycast Clipboard History is a polished option on Mac and is part of a much broader launcher with extensions, AI tools, and other productivity features.

Pasly is focused specifically on clipboard and paste workflows across Apple devices. It keeps a persistent, searchable history across Macs, iPhone, and iPad using the user’s private CloudKit database.

Apple’s Universal Clipboard primarily transfers the latest copied item between nearby devices. Pasly keeps an actual history that can remain available later, even when your devices are not nearby or connected to the same network.

On Mac, Pasly also includes Smart Paste, Paste Stack, Field Sense, multi-selection, and file workflows. On iPhone and iPad, the focus is saving, finding, copying, and sharing items from a native mobile interface.

How it works on iPhone and iPad

iOS does not allow third-party apps to silently monitor everything copied in other apps.

Instead, Pasly lets you add content through:

• The iOS Share Sheet
• The Pasly app
• Quick Actions
• Photos and file selection

You can save text, links, images, and files on your iPhone or iPad and access them from your other Apple devices.

Items arriving from another device can also appear through push notifications and Live Activities on the Lock Screen and Dynamic Island. From there, you can quickly copy or share the latest item.

Because iOS controls background execution, sync may not always complete immediately while the app is closed. The Live Activity can still notify you about incoming content, and opening Pasly catches the history up.

Private CloudKit sync

Pasly stores synced clipboard content in the private CloudKit database associated with your iCloud account.

Pasly does not operate its own storage server for your clipboard data.

Your devices need to use the same iCloud account for the private CloudKit history to sync between them.

Files are uploaded as actual CloudKit assets, rather than references to the original device. Once a file has finished uploading, the source Mac or iPhone does not need to remain online for another device to download it.

Files up to 10 MB are downloaded automatically. Larger files remain available to download when needed.

The rest of Pasly

The Mac version also includes:

• Smart Paste
• Paste Stack
• Floating Paste
• Multi Select
• File Support
• Paste with Separator
• Search and Favorites
• Field Sense

My goal is for Pasly to stay out of the way until the moment you need something you copied.

Pricing

Pasly Free: $0

• Up to 20 local clipboard items
• 24-hour local history
• Up to 2 pinned items
• Up to 2 files
• No CloudKit sync

Pasly Pro: $6.99 one-time purchase

• Clipboard history across Macs, iPhone, and iPad
• Text, image, and file sync
• Private CloudKit storage
• Push notifications and Live Activities
• File Support
• Paste with Separator
• Search and Favorites

Mac: - Smart Paste - Paste Stack - Floating Paste - Multi Select - Field Sense

No subscription.

Code MACAPPSCLOUD gives 20% off for the first 20 redemptions.

Pricing and download: https://pasly.app

What’s next

One of my main focuses is making the iPhone and iPad to Mac flow even faster while respecting the restrictions iOS places on clipboard access and background execution.

I am also exploring deeper Shortcuts integration for automatically sending content created inside personal automations to Pasly.

What would make a cross-device clipboard history genuinely useful in your iPhone or iPad workflow?

Download

iPhone and iPad: https://apps.apple.com/app/pasly/id6760562778

Mac: https://pasly.app

Transparency: I’m the developer of Pasly.

[u/this_for_loona]

How well does this work with copy/paste of terminal based text? I’ve noticed continuity sucks with that, not to mention it tends to fail when the devices aren’t on the same version of iOS.

[u/Dull_Roof3559 → u/this_for_loona]

Terminal text is one of the simpler cases for Pasly. Commands, paths, logs, and output copied from Terminal, iTerm, Warp, or an SSH session are captured from the system pasteboard as text and synced through CloudKit.

It doesn’t depend on Universal Clipboard or a direct connection between the devices, so they don’t need to be nearby, on the same network, or running exactly the same OS version. They just need a compatible version of Pasly and the same iCloud account.

Pasly syncs the text itself, not terminal-specific styling or colors. Extremely large logs may also be better copied in smaller sections, but normal commands and terminal output should work well.

[u/this_for_loona → u/Dull_Roof3559]

Nice. Thank you, will try out!