Comparison
Every clipboard tool makes different trade-offs. Here is an honest look at where Tandem fits next to Paste, Pastebot, Maccy and Apple’s built-in Universal Clipboard.
| Tandem | Paste | Pastebot | Maccy | Universal Clipboard | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Price | $19.99 once | $29.99 / year | $12.99 once | Free (open source) | Free (built-in) |
| Mac + iPhone | ✓ | ✓ | Mac only | Mac only | ✓ |
| Works without any cloud | ✓ | — | — | ✓ | — |
| Account required | None | Apple ID + subscription | Apple ID (iCloud sync) | None | Apple ID |
| Clipboard history | 500 clips (Pro) | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | — |
| File & image transfer | LAN, E2E, up to 50 MB (Pro) | via iCloud | — | — | — |
| Full-text search | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | — |
| Screenshots & image markup | Built in, free | — | — | — | — |
Competitor pricing and features checked in July 2026 from public pricing pages. Paste also offers $3.99/month and a $89.99 lifetime option.
Paste is a polished clipboard manager with iCloud sync across Mac, iPhone and iPad — and a subscription. Tandem takes the opposite stance on both counts: your clips sync peer-to-peer over your own Wi-Fi and never touch a server, and Pro is a one-time $19.99 instead of $29.99 every year. If you want cloud sync everywhere you go, Paste is a fine choice; if you want your clipboard to stay home, that is what Tandem is built for.
Pastebot ($12.99) and Maccy (free, open source) are excellent Mac clipboard managers — but they are Mac-only. Tandem’s reason to exist is the second device: copy on your Mac, paste on your iPhone from a custom keyboard, and fling files back through the iOS share sheet.
Apple’s Universal Clipboard is free and built in, and when it works it is magic. But it keeps no history (each copy silently overwrites the last), cannot transfer arbitrary files, and fails often enough that "toggle Bluetooth and try again" is a ritual. Tandem is the dependable version: continuous sync, a searchable history, QR pairing, and encrypted file transfer — still with nothing leaving your network.