How to make CS2 clips without OBS

01Why you don't need a recorder

OBS and other recorders capture your screen while you play. That means setting them up, keeping them running every match, and remembering to save the moment. Valve matchmaking (Premier, Competitive, Wingman) already records a GOTV demo of every match on its servers, with every round from every player. Your play is in that demo whether you recorded or not.

So the clip can be made from the demo instead of your screen. That's what killcam.gg does: it reads the match demo from Valve, finds your plays and clips them on our servers.

02What you need (and what you don't)

• You need: a Steam account, your game authentication code and one share code. Both come from Steam: here's how to get them.
• You don't need: OBS, any recording software, anything installed, or CS2 running on your PC. It even works for matches you've already played, while Valve still has the demo.

The authentication code isn't your password. It only lets apps read your match history, and you can revoke it on Steam's help page.

03The easiest way: set it up once

1. 01Sign in through Steam. It's Steam's own login page.
2. 02Link your match history: paste your game authentication code and a share code in the onboarding on the Matches page (or later in Settings → Match sync).
3. 03Want your recent games too? Use the share code of the oldest match in Watch → Your Matches as the starting share code, and every match after it gets pulled.
4. 04Play. New matches are found automatically within minutes of finishing, and each clip takes a few minutes to make.
5. 05Open your clips, then download the MP4 or share the link.

04What you get

• One play per round where you got a kill, tagged as Ace, Clutch (a 1vN won as last alive), Multi-kill (2+) or Kill, and ranked by kill count, aces, clutch size and style like headshots, wallbangs and noscopes.
• Clips that start 4 s before your first kill and end 2 s after the last, with dead stretches of 5 s or more cut down. Game audio only.
• Both 16:9 for YouTube and 9:16 for TikTok, Reels and Shorts from one job. The 9:16 has its kill feed laid out again for the vertical frame, so no half-cut HUD.
• Free: your top play from every match, 1080p 30fps or 720p 60fps, with a small killcam.gg logo at the bottom centre.
• [Pro](/pricing): top 3 plays every match, plus any other kill you pick with Clip it, up to 4K 120fps, no watermark, and directors like Hype, Cinematic and Reverse angle.

05Without OBS, but doing it yourself

If you'd rather keep it on your PC, there are recorders built into things you may already have: Steam Game Recording (Settings → Game Recording, "Record in background" keeps a rolling buffer you clip from the Steam overlay), NVIDIA or AMD instant replay, and Xbox Game Bar's "record what happened". The catch is the same as OBS: they only catch a play if they were already running.

Missed it? Download the demo from Watch → Your Matches, play it back and record the playback with one of those tools. It works, but it's several steps per clip, plus trimming. The full routine is in how to turn a CS2 demo into an MP4.