Trace

Unreliable & Unstable

I wasted my time creating a workflow not just once, but twice, and it still didn’t generate. It didn’t record, and it shows 0 steps and 0 seconds. I’m frustrated! I also discovered that when you create a workflow inside a folder by hitting “Capture New Flow,” it doesn’t create a workflow. So the bug seems to be related to folders. Plus, the folder feature is unstable and laggy. I understand this is a new feature, and I hope it improves soon.

Another thing that annoys me is the “Trace” logo, which you can’t remove even after trying to disable it in Global Customization. Also, the annotations inside the flow have limited customization—no font options or card styles. You can’t add much text either, because it turns into a scrollable annotation and you can’t adjust the font.

This isn’t usable for sharing with clients since it has the Trace logo. I hope they pay attention to these small details. I use Floik, Fable, and Layerpath, and I wanted to switch to this platform because of the permission-based folder system, but it’s still not stable, so I’ll wait until it’s ready.

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Update: Same issue again. This time it’s much worse, as my flow is longer and I’ve invested a lot of time in it. It’s frustrating!

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Update: I’ve found a workaround. I only get reliable workflow results in the Home folder (the default). When you’re in any other folder, there are many failures.

Another issue: the “Share to anyone” link recently broke. It can’t be viewed by anyone, even when it isn’t restricted. I moved the item to different folders, including the default Home, but it’s still not viewable.

Lastly, the Custom Domain seems to work only for the root domain. I tried using docs.xyz.com as a CNAME, but it requires the primary website at the root level, which is strange because it would take over the redirection of my main website to Trace.

Change my review from 1 to 4, as they deserve it even though they still have a lot of bugs. Hopefully, they will fix them, but I’ve learned to love this app, and I have high hopes for it.

Effortless way to create step-by-step guides

I’ve tried out other software but Tracework.ai has been my absolute favourite. It’s like a magic wand that automatically captures everything I do and turns it into super clean, easy-to-edit guides. No more taking a ton of screenshots or writing out steps by hand. The editing tools are a breeze, and sharing guides with a simple link or embed is a piece of cake. Honestly, it’s the easiest way I’ve found to create walkthroughs without all the hassle.

Great product! I'm really happy I bought it.

I bought Tier 3 and already use Trace often. For helping customers, workshops, guidance for SaaS products, etc. I am very happy!
Unfortunately, it often happens that people put effort into recording, but in the end, no recording is created, only “1 step.” Once this is fixed, I will give 5 stars.
Additionally, improvements could be made:
– I come from Germany, unfortunately, umlauts are not captured when clicking (äöüß, etc.), so I have to manually insert them in every step. I look forward to an update.
– If you turn off the Capture indicator, at least a very thin red border around the window or something similar should be visible, so that you know recording is ongoing and you don’t do everything in vain.
– Through the browser plugin, one should be able to switch the workspace.
– When forwarding the link, the customer definitely should not receive an advertisement for a free Trace account
– When sharing the link, one should be able to choose whether the document view or the interactive view opens automatically

Overall: Unconditional purchase recommendation!!

Great product

Hi,

I’m really enjoying the product so far – it’s been great! I’ve created my first demo guide, but I’ve run into a few issues:

1. When exporting to PDF, the branding appears at the bottom of each page. Is there a way to remove this?
2. Some pages display raw HTML elements like and , which makes the content harder to read. For example:
To see & add customers.Hover on “Customers”
3. When exporting in 1080p for video, the output quality seems quite blurry. Is there a way to export in higher resolution to improve clarity?

Appreciate your help!

Editing with speed

I’ve tried a lot of screen capture and recording software and the part that I hate the most is the editing after the recording. Lots of screen capture plugins will detect the clicks and create individual focus points based on clicks and other events, but then you have a 50 scene document that you need to go through and add some additional text. That’s where the slowdown happens. Trace helps close the gap and makes running through the screens and editing the callouts much faster, especially if you aren’t doing voiceovers and need to clarify the intent of the callouts. There are still some areas to improve that can make it faster, but so far this is a great experience. The co founder is also super responsive and listens to feedback.

Solid product, great roadmap, great value

This is not the first tool I have bought that does this kind of thing (doc guide creation) but it could be the last. The feature set is already worthy of the price and the roadmap has a lot of really exciting features planned (desktop recording, custom domains, auto zooming, HTML capture, export as HTML, export as Markdown, auto blurring… yes please to all!) Frankly it’s a way better roadmap than other tools I already own so despite owning other guide tools I took the plunge. After using it for a day I’ve turned off the other chrome plugins as those other tools weren’t as good, nor developing such robust features the way Trace is (I hope they deliver them soon!)

Here’s my take of pros and cons:

Pros:
1) Great features. The product does what it says. Capture is easy and editing is pretty easy too. Even more advanced features (like branching) are available which is something I hadn’t seen in several other products I’ve tried (and some I own). Sharing is easy, embedding is available, and it supports, video, interactive experiences, and PDF (with HTML and MD to come) making this extremely versatile.

2) Fantastic outreach. I got an email from the founders just after I made the purchase. There were some issues with the code verification and they personally worked to get it resolved right away. They were kind, courteous, responsive; and most importantly, they solved the issue right away.

3) Fantastic roadmap. Yes, I know it’s always a bet to buy something for features that aren’t there yet but the team is clearly thinking big and I can’t wait for the features to come as they will really make this even more amazing.

Cons:
1) There is (ironically) not guides for most of what you want to do. Some things are un intuitive: why can I only edit in one of the interactive view?, why is the default to have the recording indicator on the page and showing up in the guide shots? Why does it record ending the recording as a guide step? Luckily, using the tool to make a few first guides helps you figure these things out (like needing to click the check mark to apply the blur area vs just selecting the area) but once you figure them out, the tool works very well.

2) Exported content (e.g. PDFs) have Trace branding on them and there doesn’t seem to be a way to remove it. Perhaps this will be an option in the future but at the moment it seems to always be there.

All in all, this is a great product and I’m glad to be supporting the developers at this stage of the product. The current product is more robust than other tools I have and the roadmap has me really excited about what it will be able to do in the future.

Exactly what we needed - worth a LTD

Been seeing ads for similar tools, tried their free trial, but couldn’t get to purchasing such tools monthly.

Gave this Trace one a shot and it honestly matches up to others very well! Unlimited guides justifies the LTD right away. I run an agency so this is perfect for onboarding my clients, something I do repetitively

Personally like they’ve made their double view part of their UI. For many others, you can only see it after embedding it somewhere.

Overall, user experience is amazing, very responsive capture and easy edits like moving tooltips, blurring etc.