{"id":5112,"date":"2017-01-11T13:01:20","date_gmt":"2017-01-11T07:31:20","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/198.58.113.91\/blog\/?p=5112"},"modified":"2022-07-08T18:19:04","modified_gmt":"2022-07-08T12:49:04","slug":"capture-screen-region-snippingtool-clip-shortcut-windows-10","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.winhelponline.com\/blog\/capture-screen-region-snippingtool-clip-shortcut-windows-10\/","title":{"rendered":"Snipping Tool Command-line to Capture Screen Region"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Windows 10 (Creators Update and higher) and Windows 11 includes the capability to capture a screen region using Win + Shift + S shortcut key, as mentioned in the article <a href=\"https:\/\/www.winhelponline.com\/blog\/screenshot-portion-screen-windows-10-winkey-shift-s\/\">Screenshot a Portion of the Screen [Winkey+Shift+S]<\/a>.<!--more--><\/p>\n<h2>Contents<\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"#snippingtool_clip\">Create Snipping Tool Shortcut to Capture Screen Region Using Snipping Tool<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"#last_clip_mode\">Issue: Snipping Tool defaults to the last used Snip mode?<\/a>\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"#script_rectangular_mode\">Launch SnippingTool.exe \/clip in Rectangular Snip mode always [Scripting]<\/a>\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"#script_usage\">How to use the Windows script <\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h2><a id=\"snippingtool_clip\"><\/a>Create Snipping Tool Shortcut to Capture Screen Region Using Snipping Tool<\/h2>\n<p>If you find the <kbd>Winkey<\/kbd> + <kbd>Shift<\/kbd> + <kbd>S<\/kbd> inconvenient, you can instead create a shortcut and assign a preferred hotkey to it, such as <kbd>Ctrl<\/kbd> + <kbd>Shift<\/kbd> + <kbd>S<\/kbd>. This can be made possible using Snipping Tool&#8217;s new, and undocumented switch named <code><strong>\/clip<\/strong><\/code>.<\/p>\n<p>The <kbd>Winkey<\/kbd> + <kbd>Shift<\/kbd> + <kbd>S<\/kbd> simply invokes the Snipping Tool in the background. So, all you need to do is create a shortcut with the following target:<\/p>\n<pre><strong>C:\\Windows\\System32\\SnippingTool.exe \/clip<\/strong><\/pre>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-5113\" src=\"https:\/\/www.winhelponline.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/01\/snipping-tool-clip-1.png\" alt=\"snippingtool.exe \/clip command-line\" width=\"614\" height=\"454\" \/><\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-5114\" src=\"https:\/\/www.winhelponline.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/01\/snipping-tool-clip-2.png\" alt=\"snippingtool.exe \/clip command-line\" width=\"614\" height=\"454\" \/><\/p>\n<p>Assign a hotkey &#8212; such as Ctrl + Shift + S &#8212; or anything as you&#8217;d like. You can pin the shortcut to the taskbar if required. Clicking the shortcut or pressing the assigned hotkey would invoke capture mode (rectangular snip) &#8212; by starting the Snipping Tool in non-interactive mode.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-5115\" src=\"https:\/\/www.winhelponline.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/01\/snipping-tool-clip-3.png\" alt=\"snippingtool.exe \/clip command-line\" width=\"677\" height=\"226\" \/><\/p>\n<p>Select a region on the screen to copy it to clipboard. Open Paintbrush and paste the captured image.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-5117\" src=\"https:\/\/www.winhelponline.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/01\/snipping-tool-clip-5.png\" alt=\"snippingtool.exe \/clip command-line\" width=\"675\" height=\"274\" \/><\/p>\n<h2><a id=\"last_clip_mode\"><\/a>Snipping Tool defaults to the last used Snip mode?<\/h2>\n<div class=\"qt\"><strong>Update:<\/strong> The following section applies to Windows 10 versions older than v1809. If you&#8217;re using v1809 or higher, you don&#8217;t need this script, as the command launches rectangular snip mode always.<\/div>\n<p>Note that the Snipping Tool defaults to the capture mode you last used when running the tool interactively (i.e. without <code>\/clip<\/code> parameter). For example, if you had selected a &#8220;Window Clip&#8221; the last time when you run Snipping Tool the next time either interactively or using <code>\/clip<\/code>, it defaults to Window Snip. That&#8217;s a little glitch Microsoft needs to fix.<\/p>\n<h3><a id=\"script_rectangular_mode\"><\/a>[Script] Launch SnippingTool.exe \/clip in Rectangular Snip mode always<\/h3>\n<p>However, here is a script I wrote which Starts Snipping tool in Rectangular Snip mode always, no matter which mode you last used.<\/p>\n<pre><code>'Capture a rectangular screen region to clipboard - using Snipping Tool non-interactively.\r\n'Created for Winhelponline.com by Ramesh Srinivasan on January 20 2017.\r\n\r\nDim WshShell : Set WshShell = WScript.CreateObject(\"Wscript.Shell\")\r\n\r\n'Set the Snipping Tool capture or Snip mode in this value.\r\nstrSnipMode = \"HKCU\\SOFTWARE\\Microsoft\\Windows\\TabletPC\\Snipping Tool\\CaptureMode\"\r\n\r\n'CaptureMode DWORD values\r\n\t'1 - Free-form Snip\r\n\t'2 - Rectangular Snip\r\n\t'3 - Window Snip\r\n\r\n'We set CaptureMode to 2 for Rectangular Snip\r\nWshShell.RegWrite strSnipMode, 2, \"REG_DWORD\"\r\n\r\n'Launch the Snipping Tool to capture screen region\r\nWshShell.Run \"snippingtool.exe \/clip\",,True\r\nSet WshShell = Nothing\r\n<\/code><\/pre>\n<h4><a id=\"script_usage\"><\/a>Script Usage<\/h4>\n<ol>\n<li>Copy the above lines to Notepad. Save the file with .VBS extension, say <code>snip.vbs<\/code>.<\/li>\n<li>Place the script in a permanent folder, like <code>d:\\scripts<\/code><\/li>\n<li>Create a desktop shortcut to the script, using the following target:<br \/>\nwscript.exe d:\\scripts\\snip.vbs<\/li>\n<li>Right-click on the shortcut and click Properties<\/li>\n<li>Assign the Snipping Tool (snippingtool.exe) icon to the shortcut.<\/li>\n<li>Assign a shortcut key for the script shortcut, like <strong>Ctrl + Shift + S<\/strong><\/li>\n<li>Optionally, pin the script shortcut to your Start menu or Taskbar.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<p>Clicking this shortcut will launch the rectangular snip mode using which you can capture any region on the screen. The clipboard image can be pasted into Paint.<\/p>\n<p>Note that the new Snipping Tool command-line argument and the <kbd>Winkey<\/kbd> + <kbd>Shift<\/kbd> + <kbd>S<\/kbd> feature are available in <a href=\"https:\/\/www.winhelponline.com\/blog\/tag\/creators-update\/\">Windows 10 Creators Update<\/a> &amp; higher and Windows 11. However, in the recent builds Win + Shift + S snipping capability is powered by the Snip &amp; Sketch app (instead of Snipping Tool).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Windows 10 (Creators Update and higher) and Windows 11 includes the capability to capture a screen region using Win + Shift + S shortcut key, as mentioned in the article Screenshot a Portion of the Screen [Winkey+Shift+S].<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[8,869],"tags":[480,530],"class_list":["post-5112","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-windows-10","category-windows-11","tag-scripts","tag-snipping-tool"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":3369,"url":"https:\/\/www.winhelponline.com\/blog\/start-snipping-tool-capture-mode-default\/","url_meta":{"origin":5112,"position":0},"title":"How to Make Snipping Tool Default to New Snip when Launched","author":"Ramesh","date":"June 28, 2016","format":false,"excerpt":"Snipping Tool is a handy screenshot tool included in Windows Vista and higher, with the annotation feature. Running Snipping Tool in Windows Vista and 7 would start the utility in capture mode (New rectangular snip) automatically, but this has changed in Windows 8 and Windows 10. In Windows 8 and\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Windows 10&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Windows 10","link":"https:\/\/www.winhelponline.com\/blog\/category\/microsoft\/windows\/windows-10\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.winhelponline.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/w10-snipping-tool-mode-menu.png?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":5100,"url":"https:\/\/www.winhelponline.com\/blog\/screenshot-portion-screen-windows-10-winkey-shift-s\/","url_meta":{"origin":5112,"position":1},"title":"Screenshot a Portion of the Screen in Windows 10\/11 [Winkey+Shift+S]","author":"Ramesh","date":"January 10, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"Starting with the Windows 10 v1703 (also known as Creators Update), OneNote's popular screenshot feature has been made an Operating System feature -- you can capture a specific region of your screen to the clipboard using the Win + Shift + S shortcut key. Screenshot a Portion of the Screen\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Windows 10&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Windows 10","link":"https:\/\/www.winhelponline.com\/blog\/category\/microsoft\/windows\/windows-10\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"snipping tool save screenshots automatically","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.winhelponline.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/01\/snipping-tool-save-screenshots.png?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.winhelponline.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/01\/snipping-tool-save-screenshots.png?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.winhelponline.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/01\/snipping-tool-save-screenshots.png?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x"},"classes":[]},{"id":3304,"url":"https:\/\/www.winhelponline.com\/blog\/take-screenshot-windows-different-ways-prnt-scrn\/","url_meta":{"origin":5112,"position":2},"title":"Take Screenshot in Windows 10 Using Different Ways","author":"Ramesh","date":"June 18, 2016","format":false,"excerpt":"In any version of Windows, the PrintScreen key captures the screen to the clipboard, which can then be pasted in Paint or any image editor and saved to a file. However, Windows 8 and Windows 10 save you that additional step, making it very easy to capture your screen and\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Utilities&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Utilities","link":"https:\/\/www.winhelponline.com\/blog\/category\/utilities\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"snip & sketch - capture lock screen in windows 10","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.winhelponline.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/snip-sketch-capture-lock-screen.png?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.winhelponline.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/snip-sketch-capture-lock-screen.png?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.winhelponline.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/snip-sketch-capture-lock-screen.png?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.winhelponline.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/snip-sketch-capture-lock-screen.png?resize=700%2C400&ssl=1 2x"},"classes":[]},{"id":23950,"url":"https:\/\/www.winhelponline.com\/blog\/win-shift-s-snip-sketch-key-not-working-windows-10\/","url_meta":{"origin":5112,"position":3},"title":"[Fix] Win+Shift+S not working in Windows 10 or 11","author":"Ramesh","date":"May 3, 2021","format":false,"excerpt":"The Win\u00a0+\u00a0Shift\u00a0+\u00a0S keyboard shortcut, powered by the Snip & Sketch tool, allows you to quickly take a screenshot of a particular screen area or the entire screen. Some users are facing a situation where the hotkey combination doesn't work on their Windows 10 computer. 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The following error appears after taking a screenshot: Snipping Tool Failed to open the file. On Windows 10, the Snip &\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Windows 10&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Windows 10","link":"https:\/\/www.winhelponline.com\/blog\/category\/microsoft\/windows\/windows-10\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Snip & Sketch failed to open the file","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.winhelponline.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/06\/snip-failed-open-file-2.png?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":77996,"url":"https:\/\/www.winhelponline.com\/blog\/snipping-auto-save-screenshots-windows-10\/","url_meta":{"origin":5112,"position":5},"title":"Can Snipping Tool automatically save screenshots in Windows 10?","author":"Ramesh","date":"February 28, 2025","format":false,"excerpt":"On Windows 10, after taking a screenshot using the Win + Shift + S keyboard sequence, you need to click on the notification to open the snip in the Snipping Tool and then save it manually. 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