NewClick highlights, OBS capture, key filters, localization & more

Every keystroke, on screen.

Carnac is a keystroke and mouse-click overlay for Windows. It shows the keys and shortcuts you press, so the people watching your talk, demo or screencast can follow along. It's also a handy way to learn your own shortcuts.

winget install --id doggy8088.Carnac

All install options

Free and open source (MS-PL)Windows.NET Framework 4.5.2+

Press any key. This page runs a Carnac-style overlay.Try Ctrl + Shift + K, Alt + ↑ or Ctrl + /, or just type. Watch the overlay in the corner.On a PC with a keyboard, press any key on this page to try it.

Keymap

Who it's for

Built for people who show their work

When you move fast on the keyboard, your audience loses track. Carnac shows each key press on screen and fades it out a few seconds later.

Presentations and live demos

People at the back of the room can see every shortcut you press, so nobody gets lost when you speed up.

Screencasts and tutorials

The overlay is on screen, so your recording captures it. Viewers can pause and copy the exact keys instead of guessing.

A keyboard with three glowing keys and three floating keycaps joined by plus signs

Learning shortcuts

Watch your own keystrokes. Seeing each shortcut labelled as you use it helps new combinations stick.

Features

Everything you need, nothing in the way

Carnac lives in the system tray. Click the tray icon or use its right-click menu to configure, pause or silence the overlay at any time.

Names your shortcuts

Recognises shortcuts from bundled keymaps and wraps their description under the keys (with a toggle to hide it). Unfinished chords flush after a 1-second timeout.

Any screen, any corner

Pick any display and corner, then nudge the overlay with pixel offsets. Carnac remembers the display by device name across DPIs and monitor rearrangements.

Styled your way, live

Set font family, size and color, background color, opacity, corner radius, padding, width and fade delay—with pinned sample popups while Preferences is open.

Cut the noise

Toggle whole key categories (letters, digits, function keys, navigation and more), list ignored keys like W,A,S,D, or show only shortcuts or modifier combos.

Per-app filter

Enter a process filter regular expression such as Code|devenv to show only matching apps, or exclude specific apps with ^(?!ZoomIt64$).

Silent & pause hotkeys

Press Ctrl+Alt+P for silent mode before typing a password, or set your own Silent Mode and Pause hotkeys in Preferences and the tray menu.

Layout & language aware

Names keys after your active keyboard layout, localises UI and key labels (English, 繁體中文, 简体中文), and optionally shows app icons, standalone modifiers and ␣ spaces.

Never in the way

Sized tightly to its popup column instead of a full-screen window, so it never triggers Focus Assist, blocks auto-hide taskbars, or steals focus and clicks.

Mouse click highlights

Optionally highlight left, middle and right mouse clicks with a fading ring around the pointer—each with its own color, diameter and duration.

Ready for OBS & XSplit

Switch on Capture for OBS so Carnac Overlay appears in Window Capture with transparency while remaining click-through on your desktop.

Smart repeat grouping

Ordinary words and numbers read naturally instead of collapsing into x 2, while repeated keys past your threshold and repeated shortcuts merge into x N.

Admin & crash resilient

Notifies you when an elevated app hides its keys with a one-click Restart as administrator, backed by a self-healing key pipeline and rotating logs.

Multi-monitor & capture

Right screen. Right corner.

Choose any connected display in Preferences and Carnac keeps its overlay there, even when your monitors are stacked, offset or running at different DPIs.

Any connected display, drawn at its true relative layout and scale in Preferences
Saved by device name (e.g. \\.\DISPLAY2) and re-placed live when displays changeNew
Top-left, top-right, bottom-left or bottom-right with pixel offsets and live sample popups
Sized to its popups and optionally listed for OBS / XSplit Window CaptureNew

Try it on this page Pick a corner to move the overlay, then press some keys.

Keymaps

Knows your shortcuts by name

Each keymap targets one or more apps, so a shortcut is only labelled in the app it belongs to. These ship with Carnac:

230

Visual Studio

devenv

140

VS Code

Code

ReSharper

devenv

Google Chrome

chrome

New

Kdenlive

kdenlive

NCrunch

devenv

Secret

Opt-in sample in Keymaps\samples. Try it here:↑ ↑ ↓ ↓ ← → ← → B A

Your own

any process

Add a keymap for any app

Keymaps are small YAML files in the Keymaps folder next to Carnac.exe. Copy one, change it, and restart Carnac to load it.

process matches one or more process names without .exe (case-insensitive), joined with | such as chrome|msedge or as a YAML list. Leave it empty to match every app.
Each shortcut has a name and one or more keys. Shifted characters like Ctrl++ match Ctrl+Shift+= (use Ctrl+= for unshifted).
Chords use commas, as in Ctrl+K,Ctrl+C. If the next key doesn't follow within a second, the first key is shown on its own.

Keymaps\my-app.yml

group:   My App
process: myapp|myapp-insiders

shortcuts:
  - name: Command Palette
    keys:
      - Ctrl+Shift+P
  - name: Comment Selection
    keys:
      - Ctrl+K,Ctrl+C

Install

Up and running in a minute

Pick whichever installer you prefer—or grab the portable zip with no installation required. Carnac starts in the system tray.

WinGet

Recommended

The Windows Package Manager installs the per-user installer on Windows 10 and 11 with no UAC prompt.

winget install --id doggy8088.Carnac

Chocolatey

Install the carnac package from the Chocolatey community repository.

choco install carnac

Installer (Setup.exe)

Download Carnac-<version>-Setup.exe from GitHub Releases and run it for a per-user install with no UAC prompt.

Download Setup.exe

Portable zip

No install

Download Carnac-<version>-portable.zip from GitHub Releases, unzip it anywhere and run Carnac.exe—handy on locked-down PCs or USB sticks.

Latest release

Carnac needs .NET Framework 4.5.2 or later, which Windows 10 and 11 already include. On older systems, download it from Microsoft. Carnac never downloads or installs updates behind your back—update via winget upgrade doggy8088.Carnac or choco upgrade carnac, and optionally turn on Check for updates on startup in Preferences for a tray notice when a new release is out.

What's new

Recent changes

This fork keeps Carnac up to date with upstream Code52 and adds new features, polish and reliability fixes on top.

Latest in 2.5

October 2026

Mouse click highlightsOptionally draw a fading ring around the pointer for left, middle and right clicks, each with its own color, diameter and duration.
Key category filters, ignored keys & standalone modifiersSwitch off whole groups of keys (letters, digits, navigation, function keys and more), ignore specific keys like W,A,S,D, and optionally show standalone Ctrl, Alt, Shift and Win presses.
Live preview & richer popup stylingPinned sample popups appear while Preferences is open. Choose any installed font family, corner radius and padding, wrap or hide shortcut descriptions, and apply fade-delay changes without restarting.
Keyboard layout names & localizationShows keys as named on your active keyboard layout, and localizes Preferences, the tray menu and key labels in English, 繁體中文 and 简体中文.
OBS capture & DPI-aware overlay placementCapture for OBS makes Carnac Overlay selectable in OBS and XSplit Window Capture. The overlay is sized tightly to its popups instead of maximized and tracks monitors by device name across layouts and DPIs.
Smart repeats, chord timeout & multi-process keymapsTyped words only collapse into x N after 4 repeats (10 for digits, configurable or off), repeated shortcuts merge into one popup, unfinished chords flush after 1 second, and keymaps can match multiple processes (chrome|msedge).
Custom hotkeys, admin restart, portable zip & loggingConfigurable Silent Mode and Pause hotkeys, a tray menu with Pause/Silent toggles and one-click Restart as administrator when an elevated app hides its keys, an opt-in GitHub update check, a portable zip, and rotating error logs in %APPDATA%\Carnac\logs.

Published to GitHub Releases, WinGet (doggy8088.Carnac) and Chocolatey (carnac).

2.4 & earlier releases

September 2026 & earlier

WinGet & Chocolatey installers (2.4)Per-user Inno Setup installer published to GitHub Releases, WinGet (doggy8088.Carnac) and Chocolatey (carnac), with automated GitHub Actions builds and unit tests.
Kdenlive keymap39 shortcuts for the Kdenlive video editor, from Play/Pause to the Razor tool.
Extended special keycapsTab, CapsLock, NumLock, ScrollLock, PrintScreen, Pause, Break, ContextMenu, Space (in shortcuts) and F13–F24 are drawn as keycaps, and PageDown is labelled PageDown instead of Next (Code52/carnac#190).
Preferences in the tray menuClick or right-click the system tray icon to open Settings, pause or toggle silent mode.

All releases and SHA256 checksums are available on GitHub Releases.

Show them what you're pressing.

Carnac is free and open source. Install it in one line, or read the code on GitHub.

winget install --id doggy8088.Carnac

View on GitHub