---
title: Pause capture | Relic Help
description: Stop Relic recording what you copy for ten minutes, for an hour, or until you say so. The window shows a banner while a pause is on, and a restart clears it.
canonical: https://relic.space/help/pause-capture
source: https://relic.space/llms.txt
---
Capture

# Pause capture

Stop Relic recording what you copy for ten minutes, for an hour, or until you say so. The window shows a banner while a pause is on, and a restart clears it.

Updated 10 September 2026 · Windows, Mac, Linux

## [Pause it from the tray](#pause-it)

Sometimes you want Relic to look away for a while: you are sharing your screen, someone is using your machine, or you are working through a stack of things you would rather not have a record of. Pausing stops capture everywhere at once, for as long as you say.

1. Open the tray menu
Right-click the Relic icon in your tray. On a Mac, click the icon in the menu bar.
2. Point at Pause capture
Hover **Pause capture** and its submenu opens.
3. Pick how long

**For 10 minutes** and **For 1 hour** start a clock and end on their own. **Until I resume it** waits for you.

* Open history
* Pause capture

  * For 10 minutes
  * For 1 hour
  * Until I resume it
* Sync: connected
* Check for updates…
* Quit Relic

Nothing else changes. You can still open the window, search, copy items back out, and sync. The only thing that stops is new captures arriving.

## [While capture is paused](#the-banner)

A pause that you forget about is a pause that quietly eats a week of copies, so Relic puts a strip at the top of the window every time you open it. A timed pause counts down in it:

Capture pausedResume

Capture paused for 8 minResume

Capture paused for about an hourResume

The tray menu changes too. While a pause is on, **Pause capture** and its submenu are replaced by a single **Resume capture**.

## [Starting again](#resume)

* Press **Resume** on the banner.
* Or pick **Resume capture** from the tray menu.
* Or wait, if you chose one of the timed pauses. They end by themselves.

Anything you copied while capture was paused is gone as far as Relic is concerned. It was never written down, so there is nothing to recover and nothing to delete. Copy it again after you resume if you want it kept.

A pause never survives a restart. Quit Relic or reboot the computer and it comes back capturing, whichever pause you had running. A machine that came up silently paused would be worse than a machine that captured something you did not want, so this one is deliberate.

To leave capture on but exclude one program, use [the blocklist](https://relic.space/help/never-capture-from). To stop Relic entirely, **Quit Relic** at the bottom of the same menu closes it until you open it again. See [the tray menu](https://relic.space/help/the-popup#tray).

Related

[Never capture from an appCapture](https://relic.space/help/never-capture-from)[What Relic capturesCapture](https://relic.space/help/what-gets-captured)[The Relic windowGet started](https://relic.space/help/the-popup)[SecretsCapture](https://relic.space/help/secrets)