Moving from another app

Bring your clipboard history, pinned clips or snippets into Pesto from other apps.

Before you switch

There is no sync and no iPhone or iPad app. History stays on the Mac that made it. You can keep one encrypted backup file per Mac and restore it on another by hand, but pinboards you share between devices in Paste will not stay shared.
Command Shift V may collide with your old app. Paste also uses it. Quit the old app first, or record another shortcut in Settings → Shortcuts; the second app to start loses the key. Maccy’s default is Shift Command C. Some apps use Shift Command V for “paste without formatting”.
Search reads the first 500 characters of each clip, with words, meaning and the text inside pictures. There is no regular-expression or fuzzy mode.
Your old app’s ignored-apps list does not come across. Pesto has its own exclusions (Settings → Privacy), and password managers are skipped by default.
Pesto keeps a month of clips by default (Settings → Data). Imported history keeps its original dates, so the older part of a big import is removed at the next cleanup. The import tells you how many clips that is.

Moving from Paste

If another supported clipboard manager is installed when you finish setup, the shelf shows a one-time line offering to bring its history over. With one app, Import… opens Settings → Data at that app’s import. With several (“You have Paste and Maccy”), Choose… opens Settings → Data at Found on this Mac, a card with a row for each app and its own Import… button; you import them one at a time, and each asks for Touch ID and a file of its own, so nothing is merged blind. Not Now ends the offer for every app. Pesto finds the apps by asking macOS where they are installed; it opens none of their data until you choose to import. The card stays in Settings → Data whenever one is installed, and a row says how many clips it brought in until you quit Pesto.

Settings → Data → Another app’s library → Import… → From Paste… reads a copy of your Paste library and leaves Paste unchanged. Each of its pinboards becomes a collection, and those clips are pinned. You can also bring in its clipboard history; those clips are not pinned, so your retention setting may remove the older ones. Clips you already have are skipped. Formatting (bold, links, rich text) comes across with a clip, as it does when you copy one. What does not:

A clip that sat in two pinboards ends up in one collection (the first it meets).
Manual order inside a pinboard: clips are ordered by date, and a pinboard’s color is replaced by a neutral one unless it is one of Paste’s default boards.
Copies Paste marked concealed or transient (a password manager’s, for example) are skipped, as a live copy would be.
Only the first item of a multi-item copy, and nothing that lives only in Paste’s iCloud data: Pesto reads the library file on this Mac. The file chooser starts where Paste keeps it (the App Store, Setapp and direct versions are all looked for); it is a hidden folder, so press Command Shift. in the chooser if you have to look for it yourself. The import tells you how many clips came in and how many were left out.

Moving from Maccy or Alfred

Maccy

Settings → Data → Another app’s library → Import… → From Maccy… opens Maccy’s library file (the file chooser starts in its folder) and reads a copy of it; the original is never changed and never opened for writing. Before anything comes in, a sheet shows what was found (pinned clips, history, how many clips cannot be imported, and how many clips are older than the time you keep clips, which the next cleanup removes), and you confirm. Maccy’s pinned clips go to a collection called “Pinned in Maccy”. Clips you already have are skipped, and Pesto’s exclusion rules apply as for any copy.

Alfred

Settings → Data → Another app’s library → Import… → From Alfred… opens Alfred’s clipboard database (the file chooser starts in its folder) and reads a copy of it read-only. Before anything comes in, the preview sheet shows what was found and you confirm. Alfred’s text and file paths come over; its pictures are skipped. Clips you already have are skipped, and Pesto’s exclusion rules apply as for any copy.

Moving from other clipboard apps

Settings → Data → Another app’s library → Import… also supports direct import from CleanClip, PasteNow, CopyClip, PastePal, Pastebot, Clipy, Flycut, and Unclutter. For each app, the file chooser starts in its default folder. Pesto reads a copy of the file, read-only, and leaves the original alone. Before anything comes in, a sheet shows what was found (pinned clips, history and skipped clips) and you confirm.

CleanClip

Brings in CleanClip’s history with its titles and source apps. Pinned clips become a collection.

PasteNow

Brings in text, rich text and links. Each Pastelist category becomes a collection.

CopyClip

Reads CopyClip’s database as plain-text clips.

PastePal

Reads PastePal’s store; pinned clips go to a collection called “Pinned in PastePal”.

Pastebot

Reads text, rich text and source apps from Pastebot’s store.

Clipy

Reads clips from Clipy’s database.

Flycut

Clips are read from Flycut’s preferences file. Its favorites go to a collection called “Favorites in Flycut”.

Unclutter

Clips and favorites are read from Unclutter’s storage folder.

Raycast

Raycast encrypts its local clipboard database with SQLCipher using a key stored in your login Keychain, so Pesto cannot read its database directly. You can import Raycast snippets via JSON export: see Moving snippets from another app below.

Moving anything else

Try Other File… first (see above). If your app’s export does not fit, Pesto also reads the JSON that its own Export History writes, so a script can build one. The file is a JSON array of clips:

[
  {
    "id": "6A8C5B0E-2B2F-4D43-9E8C-5C1D3A0F7E11",
    "timestamp": "2026-10-16T09:30:00Z",
    "type": "text",
    "previewText": "the clip's text",
    "sourceApp": "Safari",
    "sourceBundleID": "com.apple.Safari",
    "customTitle": null,
    "userNote": null,
    "tags": [],
    "isPinned": false
  }
]

type is text, code, url or color; only text can be imported this way, and only its first 500 characters. Dates are ISO 8601 and id is a new UUID for each clip. To bring in a library with pictures or full text, ask for an importer for that app (SUPPORT.md says where) and attach a small sample file.

Moving snippets from another app

Settings → Data → Another app’s library → Import… → Snippets File… reads the JSON file Raycast exports (Pesto does not read Alfred’s own .alfredsnippets file or TextExpander’s, and has no abbreviation expansion: a snippet is a pinned clip you paste from the shelf). Single-brace placeholders such as {date}, {clipboard} and {uuid} become Pesto’s {{date}}, {{clipboard}} and {{uuid}}. A snippet with no placeholder is pinned as an ordinary clip, and one that uses something Pesto does not fill in, such as {selection}, keeps that text as typed; the sheet counts both.

Moving from an app that is not listed

Settings → Data → Another app’s library → Import… → Other File… reads a CSV, JSON or text file of clips, which most clipboard managers can export. Pesto asks for Touch ID, then for the file, then shows what it found: for a CSV or a JSON list, which column is the clip’s text, when it was copied and whether it is pinned (it picks them by name when it can; a column you do not choose is never read); for a text file, whether one clip is a block between blank lines, a line, or a block between lines of dashes. Continue shows the usual import preview with its counts, and nothing comes in until you press Import. Rows with no date keep the file’s order and are dated now; pictures and files are not imported, secrets are masked as on a copy, and clips you already have are skipped.

This guide matches Pesto as of October 29, 2026. App commit 70204d2.