What to use instead of Rewind AI in 2026: six alternatives compared

Rewind AI is gone. Meta acquired its parent company, Limitless, on December 5, 2025, and the Rewind app's screen and audio capture switched off on December 19, 2025 (9to5mac, December 5, 2025). What to use instead depends on which half of Rewind you relied on. Littlebird is the managed successor for the memory, with an assistant that acts on it. Screenpipe and Perfect Memory AI keep everything on your own machine, one as a toolkit for builders and one as a finished app. Granola covers meetings and nothing else. Microsoft Recall exists only on Windows Copilot+ PCs, and the Limitless Pendant is no longer sold. Six tools, compared below on storage, capture, platform, and price.

Who is ranking whom: this site is published by Littlebird, and Littlebird appears in this ranking. We put it first where we believe the fit is real, we explain why in plain terms, and every entry ends with an honest reason to choose it instead. Competitor descriptions are verified against public materials and dated in the text.

You hit the shortcut out of habit, expecting the timeline to slide open, and nothing happens. Rewind was the Mac app that let you scroll back through your own Tuesday and search it. Here is where its users are going, ranked, with the shutdown facts and the export steps further down for anyone who still has recordings to save.

What should you use instead of Rewind AI?

Pick by the half of Rewind you actually used. Rewind did three jobs at once, and no successor does all three.

• The memory. You searched your past: the tab you closed, the thing someone said on a call, what you were doing at 3 pm on Thursday. Littlebird is the managed successor for this, and it adds an assistant that acts on the memory.
• The local storage. You chose Rewind because nothing left your Mac. Screenpipe, a source-available toolkit, and Perfect Memory AI, a finished app, both keep the recordings on your own machine (their sites, read October 6, 2026), and a cloud product is the wrong answer for you.
• The meetings. You mostly went back to old calls. A focused, bot-free notetaker like Granola covers the whole need, and Littlebird covers it too if you also want the rest of the day.

How do the Rewind alternatives compare?

Four attributes decide this choice, and every competitor cell carries the date it was checked.

• Littlebird. What it captures: The text and elements of your active window, plus meeting transcripts; no video, no screenshots. Where the memory lives: Encrypted in the AWS cloud (US East). Platforms: Mac and Windows; iOS and Android companions. Price from: Basic $0; Plus $17 per month billed annually, $20 monthly. Pick it when: You want the memory plus an assistant that acts on it.
• Screenpipe. What it captures: Screen content, app text, browser context, and audio, continuously. Where the memory lives: A local SQLite database on your device (screenpipe.com, verified October 6, 2026). Platforms: macOS, Windows 10/11, Linux. Price from: Free tier after a 7-day trial; Basic $25 per month (screenpipe.com, verified October 6, 2026). Pick it when: You want to own the pipeline and build the assistant yourself.
• Perfect Memory AI. What it captures: Screen text via OCR, plus meeting transcripts. Where the memory lives: On your own Mac or PC, screenshots encrypted with AES-256 (perfectmemory.ai, verified October 6, 2026). Platforms: Mac and Windows. Price from: Free tier; Pro $15 per month billed yearly (perfectmemory.ai, verified October 6, 2026). Pick it when: You want Rewind's local timeline model as a finished app.
• Granola. What it captures: Meeting audio from your computer, no bot; notes shaped by what you jot. Where the memory lives: Not verified here; Basic keeps 30 days of history (granola.ai/pricing, verified September 23, 2026). Platforms: macOS, Windows, iOS, Android. Price from: Basic $0; Business $14 per user per month (granola.ai/pricing, verified September 23, 2026). Pick it when: Meetings were the whole use case.
• Microsoft Recall. What it captures: Periodic screenshots of your screen. Where the memory lives: On the Copilot+ PC, encrypted (Microsoft's Recall privacy page, read September 23, 2026). Platforms: Windows 11 on Copilot+ PCs only; no Mac version. Price from: Included with Windows 11 on qualifying PCs. Pick it when: You moved to a Copilot+ PC and want a built-in timeline.
• Limitless Pendant. What it captures: Conversations around you, through a wearable microphone. Where the memory lives: Not verified here. Platforms: Wearable with a companion app. Price from: No longer sold since December 5, 2025 (9to5mac). Pick it when: You already own one; new customers can't buy it.

Which Rewind alternative should you pick?

Ranked by how much of Rewind's job each one does.

1. Littlebird: the ambient memory, plus an assistant on top

Littlebird is an AI assistant that already understands your work. It pays attention to the active window you are working in and transcribes your meetings with no bot on the call, then answers questions and drafts from that memory. Where Rewind was primarily search over your past, Littlebird also acts: Routines deliver proactive updates like a morning briefing, and Chat drafts follow-ups grounded in what it captured. Ask it what you decided on Thursday's call and the answer comes from the transcript it took, not from a note you had to write.

It works immediately with zero setup and gets more useful over time, on Mac and Windows. In a Littlebird user survey (2026), 80% of subscribers agree it reduced their anxiety about forgetting details or dropping the ball.

The storage model is the honest difference from Rewind: the app runs on your computer, and the memory it builds is encrypted and stored in the AWS cloud, not on your device. It is SOC 2 Type II compliant, never sells your data, and you can pause capture, exclude apps and sites, and delete the last hour, the last day, or everything. If Rewind's local-only storage was the reason you chose it, that matters, and the next two entries are for you. The full posture is in Is Littlebird safe?

Choose Littlebird when what you miss is the memory, and what you always wanted on top of it was an assistant that does something with it.

2. Screenpipe: the local toolkit for people who build

Screenpipe describes itself as a local-first memory layer for your desktop. It records screen content, app text, browser context, and audio continuously, reading text through accessibility APIs with OCR as a fallback and transcribing audio with Whisper on the machine, and it stores all of it in a local SQLite database on your device (screenpipe.com/about, read October 6, 2026). It runs on macOS, Windows 10 and 11, and Linux. As of October 6, 2026 its own page calls the code source-available under a Screenpipe Commercial License, publicly auditable on GitHub, rather than open source. Its site lists a free tier after a 7-day trial, Basic at $25 per month, Business at $50 per seat per month, and Enterprise at $150 per seat per month (screenpipe.com/about, read October 6, 2026).

The tradeoff runs the other way from Littlebird: it is a toolkit more than a finished assistant, so expect to set up, maintain, and build on it yourself. We don't claim privacy superiority over a genuinely local tool; the case for Littlebird is zero setup and a managed experience.

Choose Screenpipe when keeping the data on your own machine is non-negotiable and you are comfortable assembling your own tooling. That is a legitimate requirement, and a cloud product is the wrong answer for it.

3. Perfect Memory AI: Rewind's local timeline, as a finished app

Perfect Memory AI is the closest thing on this list to what Rewind was. In its own words, it remembers what you have seen on your screen and heard in meetings, keeps it on your own Mac or PC, and lets you search it yourself or through Claude or ChatGPT. It captures screen text through OCR, transcribes meetings on Zoom, Google Meet, Teams, Slack, Webex, and WhatsApp, and encrypts the stored screenshots with AES-256 (perfectmemory.ai, read October 6, 2026). Its site lists a free tier with 10 AI assists and 30 AI meetings a month and unlimited search and recordings, Pro at $15 per month billed yearly, and a separately listed offline version at $79 (perfectmemory.ai, read October 6, 2026).

The difference from Littlebird is what the memory does next. Perfect Memory is a searchable record, with the assistant layer coming from whatever you point at it. Littlebird is the assistant: it briefs you before you ask, drafts from the call it transcribed, and needs nothing configured. Perfect Memory also keeps screenshots, which Littlebird never takes.

Choose Perfect Memory AI when you want Rewind's model, a timeline of screenshots and meetings stored on your own machine, without building it yourself.

4. Granola: if what you actually used Rewind for was meetings

Granola is a focused, bot-free meeting notepad. It uses your computer's audio, so no bot joins the call, and its notes take shape from what you jot during the meeting, with customizable templates, on macOS, Windows, iOS, and Android (granola.ai, verified September 23, 2026). Basic is $0 with 30 days of meeting history and Business is $14 per user per month (granola.ai/pricing, verified September 23, 2026). It does not capture your screen, the point for some ex-Rewind users and the limit for others; the Granola alternatives guide covers the second group.

Choose Granola when meetings were the entire use case and you do not want screen capture at all.

5. Microsoft Recall: the built-in option, on Windows only

Microsoft Recall is a Windows 11 feature that takes periodic screenshots of your screen, stores them encrypted on the device, and lets you scroll back through a timeline or search what you saw. It runs only on Copilot+ PCs, is off until you opt in, and Microsoft has not shipped or announced a macOS version as of September 2026 (Microsoft's Recall support page, verified September 13, 2026). For most Rewind users, who were on a Mac by definition, it is not an option; the detail is in Is Microsoft Recall available on Mac?

Choose Microsoft Recall when you have moved to a Copilot+ PC and want a built-in screenshot timeline with nothing to install.

6. Limitless Pendant: what Rewind became, and why you can't buy it

The Limitless Pendant is the wearable Rewind's company built after the 2024 rebrand: a microphone-enabled necklace that records and transcribes the conversations around you. It stopped being sold on December 5, 2025, the day of the Meta acquisition; existing customers were promised support for at least another year, with the Unlimited plan free and no subscription (9to5mac, December 5, 2025). It never captured a screen, so it was never a Rewind replacement.

Keep the Pendant if you already own one. Nobody else can choose it.

What's the best Rewind alternative for Mac?

Littlebird if you want an assistant with the memory, Perfect Memory AI if you want Rewind's local timeline as an app, and Screenpipe if you want to build on the raw data. All three run on the Mac (their sites, read October 6, 2026), and Littlebird's Hover is Mac-only. Microsoft Recall does not exist on the Mac at all, and macOS has no built-in equivalent as of September 2026 (Apple's macOS 27 feature page, verified September 13, 2026).

What happened to Rewind AI?

Four dates tell the story. Sources are named after each one.

• 2022: Rewind launches on the Mac. The app recorded what crossed your screen and speakers and made it searchable, with the recordings stored on your own machine (9to5mac, December 5, 2025, recalling its 2022 coverage; the timeline now published at rewind.ai, read September 24, 2026).
• 2024: the company becomes Limitless. Rewind AI renamed itself Limitless and shipped the Limitless Pendant, a wearable that records and transcribes conversations. The Mac app stopped being the main product (9to5mac, December 5, 2025; rewind.ai timeline, read September 24, 2026).
• December 5, 2025: Meta acquires Limitless. Limitless announced the acquisition, told customers the Rewind app would be discontinued, and stopped selling the Pendant the same day (9to5mac, December 5, 2025).
• December 19, 2025: capture switches off. Limitless said its final update would disable all screen and audio capture in the Rewind app from that date (9to5mac, December 5, 2025, quoting Limitless).

One more thing worth knowing if you go looking: the rewind.ai domain now hosts an unrelated site offering free AI tools, and it says on its own page that it has no connection to the original Rewind, Limitless, or Meta (rewind.ai, read September 24, 2026). The company you remember is not there.

What does the shutdown mean for the data you still have?

Everything below comes from the Limitless announcement as reported by 9to5mac on December 5, 2025, so check the Limitless help center for the current state before you act.

• The app can't record anymore. Capture was disabled on December 19, 2025, and Limitless said it was sunsetting non-Pendant functionality like Rewind. Treat what you have as an archive.
• You can export. Limitless shipped a tool to download your transcripts and account information, and you can delete your account and data from inside the app. Export first, even if you plan to delete: it is the only copy you will have.
• Some regions lost the service outright. As of December 5, 2025, Limitless said its service was no longer available in Brazil, China, the European Union, Israel, South Korea, Turkey, and the United Kingdom, and pointed those users to the export instructions.

How do you move from Rewind to Littlebird?

About fifteen minutes, most of it the export.

1. Export from Limitless first. Use the download tool Limitless shipped, and keep the file somewhere safe before you delete anything (9to5mac, December 5, 2025).
2. Install Littlebird and grant the permission. Mac and Windows. On the Mac it asks for accessibility permission, which is how it reads the text and elements of your active window. It is not a screen recorder: no video, no screenshots, no keystroke logging. The mechanism in full is in What does Littlebird actually see?
3. Decide what it may see. Exclude specific apps, website domains, or whole categories such as banking, social media, shopping, entertainment, and health. Password managers are excluded by default, and credit-card numbers and API keys are redacted before storage. Pause any time; delete the last hour, the last day, or everything.
4. Bring your old transcripts. Littlebird imports transcripts and summaries from other apps through Settings, and they become searchable Meeting Notes. Whether a Limitless export drops in cleanly depends on its format, so keep the original file.
5. Let the next meeting take its own notes. Meeting Notes transcribes calls from the audio on your computer, no bot, and produces a summary with decisions and action items. Then ask in Chat what you decided and what you promised. That is the Rewind scrollback, answered in a sentence.
6. Replace the shortcut habit. Hover opens Littlebird over whatever you are doing on the Mac with a double-tap of Option, so the reflex you built with Rewind has somewhere to go. Set one Routine, a morning briefing, and the memory starts coming to you.

No single tool fully replaces Rewind

No single tool replicates Rewind exactly, because Rewind's local-first, capture-everything design was the thing that shut down. Littlebird carries the memory forward in managed, cloud form with an assistant on top; Perfect Memory AI and Screenpipe carry the local half forward, as an app and as a toolkit. Decide which half you were using, then pick.

Common questions

What should I use instead of Rewind AI?

Littlebird if you want the memory with an assistant that acts on it, Perfect Memory AI if you want Rewind's local timeline as a finished app, Screenpipe if you want to build on your own data, and Granola if meetings were the whole use case. Microsoft Recall is Windows-only, and the Limitless Pendant is no longer sold (9to5mac, December 5, 2025).

What happened to Rewind AI?

Rewind rebranded as Limitless in 2024 and refocused on the Limitless Pendant. Meta acquired Limitless on December 5, 2025, the Pendant stopped being sold that day, and the Rewind app's screen and audio capture was disabled on December 19, 2025 (9to5mac, December 5, 2025).

Can I still download or use the Rewind app?

No. Capture was switched off on December 19, 2025, and Limitless said it was sunsetting non-Pendant functionality like Rewind (9to5mac, December 5, 2025). What you have left is an archive; export it through the Limitless tool while you can.

What is the best Rewind AI alternative for Mac?

Littlebird for an assistant with the memory, Perfect Memory AI for a local timeline, and Screenpipe for a toolkit you run yourself; all three run on the Mac (their sites, read October 6, 2026). Microsoft Recall has no Mac version.

Is there an open-source Rewind alternative?

Screenpipe is the closest. As of October 6, 2026 its own page calls the code source-available under a Screenpipe Commercial License and publicly auditable on GitHub, rather than open source (screenpipe.com/about, read October 6, 2026).

Which Rewind alternative keeps the data on my own computer?

Screenpipe stores everything in a local SQLite database on your device, and Perfect Memory AI stores everything on your own Mac or PC (their sites, read October 6, 2026). Littlebird's memory is encrypted and stored in the AWS cloud.

Is rewind.ai still the Rewind company?

No. The domain now hosts an unrelated site offering free AI tools, and that site states it has no affiliation with the original Rewind, Limitless, or Meta (rewind.ai, read September 24, 2026).

Is Littlebird local-only like Rewind was?

No. The app runs on your computer, and the memory it builds is encrypted and stored in the AWS cloud. For those who require local-only systems, Littlebird may not be the right fit today.

Is there an AI tool that sees my screen and remembers everything?

Littlebird is the closest current answer among managed products: it pays attention to your active window and transcribes meetings with no bot, then builds a searchable memory you can ask questions against. Perfect Memory AI and Screenpipe, above, are the equivalents for people who want the data kept on their own machine.

Do you sell my data?

No. Our customers are our users, not advertisers.

Remember everything. That idea deserved to outlive the app.

No setup, no bot in your meetings, and a free Basic plan with full context from day one.

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Product facts come from our maintained internal fact base. Rewind, Limitless, and Meta acquisition details from 9to5mac's December 5, 2025 report and the timeline published at rewind.ai, read September 24, 2026. Screenpipe facts and prices from screenpipe.com/about and Perfect Memory AI facts and prices from perfectmemory.ai, both read October 6, 2026. Granola from granola.ai and granola.ai/pricing, verified September 23, 2026. Microsoft Recall from Microsoft's Recall support page, verified September 13, 2026, and its Recall privacy page, read September 23, 2026; macOS from Apple's macOS 27 feature page, verified September 13, 2026.