ChatGPT Computer History Records Clicks, Not Screens
On August 13, 2026, OpenAI shipped Computer History in the ChatGPT desktop app for macOS. The pitch is one sentence: ChatGPT can now remember your activity across the apps and websites on your computer, so future conversations need less explaining.
It also quietly retires something. Computer History replaces Chronicle, the screen-memory research preview OpenAI launched for Codex on Mac back in April, and not as a rename. OpenAI describes it as a rebuilt system, and the rebuild changed the most important thing about it: how it watches you.
This is a straight explainer. What Computer History actually records, where that data goes, who is allowed to turn it on, and what to do if you fall outside the fences. We build LUCI, which competes with this feature, and it appears at the end, flagged up front so you can weigh the rest accordingly.
What Computer History actually captures
Chronicle took screenshots. Computer History does not.
Instead it records interaction events exposed through macOS accessibility features: clicks, typing, keyboard shortcuts, and switching between apps. Per OpenAI's own documentation, the feature explicitly does not capture screenshots, screen recordings, microphone input, or system audio. Private browsing is omitted entirely.
Those raw events become memories through a summarization pass, and the events themselves are handled as temporary files that live on your Mac for up to 48 hours before deletion. OpenAI processes those temporary event files on its servers to generate the memories, states that they are not retained after processing except where legally required, and says they are not used for model training. The finished memories come back to your machine as local files.
The result is a timeline. Each item carries a title, a summary of the activity, the apps or websites involved, a suggested skill for work that looks repeatable, and buttons to open the memory file in Finder or delete the item. Both ChatGPT and Codex can draw on it as context.
Where the memories live
Generated memories are written to ~/.codex/memories/extensions/skysight/ as plain-text Markdown, inside your App Group container, and they persist until you delete them yourself.
They are not encrypted. OpenAI discloses this directly: because the files are plain text under your user account, other programs running as the same macOS user could read them. That is a meaningful footnote for a file that, by design, contains a running summary of your working day.
Chronicle vs Computer History
| Chronicle (Apr 2026) | Computer History (Aug 2026) | |
|---|---|---|
| Status | Replaced | Current |
| Capture method | Screenshots | Accessibility interaction events |
| Screen images uploaded | Yes (selected frames) | No screenshots captured at all |
| Memory generation | OpenAI servers | OpenAI servers |
| Memory files | Local, unencrypted Markdown | Local, unencrypted Markdown |
| Usable by | Codex only | ChatGPT and Codex |
| Plans | ChatGPT Pro | Pro, Business, Enterprise |
| Platform | macOS | macOS |
The move from frames to events is a genuine privacy improvement, and it is worth saying so plainly: an event stream of clicks and keystroke activity is a smaller, less lurid thing to hand over than a folder of pictures of your screen. It is also a narrower record. Screenshots capture whatever was visible; events capture what you did. If the thing you need to remember was on screen but you never interacted with it, there is nothing in the log to reconstruct it from.
Who can actually turn it on
This is where most people bounce off it. Computer History is off by default, and turning it on requires clearing four gates:
- macOS only. No Windows, no Linux, even though the ChatGPT desktop app itself landed on Linux two days before Computer History shipped.
- Pro, Business, or Enterprise. Plus and Free are not eligible.
- Admin approval on Business and Enterprise. Workspace administrators must enable access before anyone on the team can switch it on.
- Not in the EEA, Switzerland, or the UK. Initial availability excludes all three.
Memories must also be enabled on your account for the feature to work at all.
Add those up and the addressable set is narrow: paying macOS users outside Europe whose IT department has said yes. If you are a Windows developer, on a Plus plan, or sitting in London or Berlin, the feature does not exist for you, and there is no announced date when it will.
What it will never remember
Two gaps are structural rather than temporary, and both follow from the design.
Meetings. No microphone, no system audio. Computer History cannot tell you what was said on the call, only that a call app was open and what you typed while it was. For a lot of knowledge work, the decisions live in the conversation, not in the clicks.
Anything outside ChatGPT and Codex. The memory is written into OpenAI's own directory for OpenAI's own models. If your day runs through Claude Code in one terminal and Cursor in another, that context is invisible to them. You are building a memory that exactly one vendor can read.
That second one is the strategic shape of the feature, not an oversight. Ambient memory is sticky: once a model knows your stack, your conventions, and your open threads, switching costs go up sharply. Computer History is a very good reason to keep everything inside one assistant.
If you are outside the fences
We build LUCI, so treat the comparison below as interested but factual. Every row is checkable.
LUCI does the same ambient-memory job with the fences removed. The pipeline runs end to end on your device, it captures meetings alongside your screen activity, the memory is encrypted at rest, and it is exposed to whatever agent you already use through the Agent Bridge rather than to one vendor's assistant.
| LUCI | ChatGPT Computer History | |
|---|---|---|
| Platforms | Mac + Windows | macOS only |
| Cost | Free | Pro, Business, or Enterprise plan |
| EEA / Switzerland / UK | Available | Excluded at launch |
| Where memories are generated | On your device | OpenAI's servers |
| Memory storage | Encrypted at rest | Plain-text Markdown, unencrypted |
| Meetings and calls | Captured | Not captured (no mic or system audio) |
| Which agents can read it | Claude, Cursor, Codex, and other MCP clients | ChatGPT and Codex |
| Admin approval required | No | Yes, on Business and Enterprise |
One honest caveat on the last row, because the industry is sloppy about this: connecting any agent to any memory means the parts it reads reach that model's vendor. LUCI keeps your memory on your machine and hands over only what a query actually needs. But if you point Claude at it, Claude sees what Claude reads. The difference is that you choose the agent, the memory outlives it, and nothing is uploaded to build the memory in the first place.
The other difference is what survives. Computer History distills your day into summaries and keeps the summaries. LUCI keeps the searchable record underneath the distilled layer, so when the summary is not enough you can still drill down to the actual moment. Your agent reads from it and writes your Life, a folder of ordinary files on your disk that outlives any app, including ours.
Download LUCI for Mac or Windows, or read the full comparison with OpenAI's screen memory.
Frequently asked questions
Is Computer History the same as Chronicle?
No. Computer History replaced Chronicle on August 13, 2026, and OpenAI describes it as a rebuilt system rather than an update. The substantive change is the capture method: Chronicle took screenshots, while Computer History records interaction events through macOS accessibility features and captures no screenshots at all.
Does Computer History send my data to OpenAI?
Partly. It captures no screenshots, and the memory files end up on your Mac, but the temporary interaction event files are processed on OpenAI's servers to generate those memories. OpenAI says the temporary files are not retained after processing except where legally required, and are not used for model training.
Is Computer History available on Windows?
No. It is macOS only, on the ChatGPT desktop app. This is despite the desktop app shipping for Linux on August 11, 2026. If you need screen memory on Windows, LUCI runs on both Mac and Windows.
Can I use Computer History in the UK or the EU?
Not at launch. Initial availability excludes the European Economic Area, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom, and OpenAI has not announced a date for those regions.
Are the memory files encrypted?
No. They are stored as plain-text Markdown in ~/.codex/memories/extensions/skysight/. OpenAI notes that other programs running under the same macOS user account could access them.
Can Claude or Cursor read Computer History memories?
No. The memories are written for ChatGPT and Codex. Agent-agnostic memory is the gap LUCI is built to fill: the same local memory answers queries from Claude, Cursor, and Codex alike.
Does Computer History record my meetings?
No. It has no access to your microphone or system audio, so nothing said on a call is captured. It can only record that a meeting app was in use and what you typed while it was open.
How do I turn Computer History off or delete what it stored?
It is off by default and opt-in. Once on, you can pause collection, exclude specific apps and websites, review the timeline, and delete items individually or in bulk: the last ten minutes, hour, day, or everything.
