What does my audience see when I use Kopya while presenting?
In a supported screen share, the audience sees what you are presenting and not the Kopya panel. The panel is a separate always-on-top window that Kopya asks the operating system to leave out of capture; when the capture tool honours that request, it stays on your display without entering the image viewers receive. A projector still shows it.
Kopya is a desktop AI assistant for macOS and Windows that answers questions about what is on your screen when you press a hotkey; its panel is excluded from supported screen shares and recordings. On Windows 10 version 2004 or newer that exclusion is documented Windows behaviour. On macOS it is not dependable: Apple calls the flag Kopya uses legacy, and apps that capture through ScreenCaptureKit, including built-in screen recording on recent macOS, may show the panel, so test your setup first. The screen-share privacy feature page explains the mechanism, and the compatibility page tracks what each vendor documents.
How is this different from presenter view?
Presenter view is a slide-app feature: it puts your notes and the next slide on a second display while the audience sees the slideshow. Kopya is not tied to slides, answers about any app on your screen, and works with one display, because what stays out of a supported share is the panel itself.
| What to compare | Presenter view | Kopya panel |
|---|---|---|
| What it covers | Slide apps only | Any app on your screen |
| Displays needed | Two | One is enough |
| Content | Notes you wrote in advance | Answers about the screen at the moment you press the hotkey |
| Stays private because | It sits on a display you do not share | OS-level capture exclusion in supported tools |
| On a projector | Not projected in extended display mode | Visible whenever the panel is on the projected display |
How does the hotkey flow work in the middle of a demo?
Press ⌘⇧Space on macOS or Ctrl+Shift+Space on Windows. Kopya takes one screenshot of your primary display, sends it with your optional question to its server and on to the AI provider, and shows the answer in the panel. The panel does not take keyboard focus, so your demo stays where it was.
Park the panel before you start
It sits top-centre of your primary display, collapses to a small pill and stays above full-screen apps. Drag it clear of the work you are showing.
Press the capture hotkey when you need it
⌘⇧Space or Ctrl+Shift+Space captures the primary display. Type a question of up to 2,000 characters, or leave it empty and Kopya answers the task the screen implies.
Read the answer and carry on
In a supported share the audience keeps seeing the app you are demoing. Each follow-up takes a fresh screenshot and counts as one answer.
Show the panel on purpose when you want to
⌘⇧P or Ctrl+Shift+P toggles screen-share privacy, and the label switches between “Hidden in screen shares” and “Visible in screen shares”. Turn it off when the audience should see the answer.
Does a projector or mirrored display show the Kopya panel?
Yes, whenever the panel sits on the display you are projecting or mirroring. Capture exclusion acts only on software capture, a screen share or a recording, and only where the system honours it. It does nothing to a physical display: a projector, a meeting-room TV or a mirrored screen is a monitor, so the room sees the panel.
Microsoft’s documentation for the Windows flag Kopya uses puts the rule on the monitor, not on the eyes in the room: the window shows on a monitor, and “Everywhere else, the window does not appear at all.” The same goes for someone looking at your screen or pointing a phone camera at it; Microsoft adds that this is not a security or DRM mechanism. In a room, use extended display mode rather than mirroring: slideshow on the projector, the display holding the panel to yourself. In a hybrid meeting, only the remote share can leave the panel out.
What should I check before I present?
Run the 60-second self-test with the exact tool and share mode you will use, confirm the panel reads “Hidden in screen shares”, and decide what each display in the room will show. Kopya has published no per-tool test results, so your own test is the evidence.
- Self-test the share. Start your tool and share mode, join from a second device or record ten seconds, and look at what actually appears. Steps on the compatibility page.
- Check the panel label. It should read “Hidden in screen shares”; ⌘⇧P or Ctrl+Shift+P switches it.
- Prefer a single-window share when one app is all you need to show: it does not depend on capture exclusion at all. Alternatives are compared in five ways to hide a window from a screen share; share modes of the meeting apps in Zoom, Meet and Teams.
- Set a projector to extended mode, not mirroring, and keep the panel’s display to yourself.
- Close the sign-in window and silence notifications. Only the panel is excluded from capture; the sign-in window and the menu-bar or tray icon are ordinary UI.
- Re-test after OS or app updates, especially on macOS, where what works today changed with ScreenCaptureKit.
Common questions
Does Kopya join my meeting or record audio?
No. Kopya has no meeting bot and records no audio. It takes one screenshot of your primary display when you press the capture hotkey, answers in its panel, and does nothing until you press the hotkey again.
Is the panel invisible to my audience on a Mac?
Not reliably. Apple documents the window flag Kopya uses as legacy, and apps capturing through ScreenCaptureKit, including built-in screen recording on recent macOS, may show the panel. Share a single window, or test your exact setup: what works on Mac.
Can I present from a second display and still use Kopya?
Yes. The panel sits on your primary display and Kopya captures that display only. Put the slideshow on the projector or shared display and keep the primary one to yourself. For Kopya to answer about the slides, they must be on the primary display.