The 8 best Day One alternatives
Day One scores 7.7 out of 10 here, and its weak spots are specific: fifty dollars a year is steep next to general note apps. These are the apps that fix that, ranked by overall score.
Grape
Take the note. The AI does the filing, the studying and the searching.
Mac / Win / Linux / iOS / Android
Gains you: speaker identification, meeting recording, multi-level folders. Same territory: privacy & ownership.
$3/mo
Obsidian
Plain markdown files on your disk, with a plugin ecosystem bolted on top.
Win / Mac / iOS / Android / Linux
Gains you: meeting recording, multi-level folders, internal links. Same territory: privacy & ownership.
$4/mo
Apple Notes
Already on your phone, and better than it has any right to be.
Mac / iOS / Web
Gains you: meeting recording, multi-level folders, internal links. Same territory: minimal & fast.
Free
Craft
Documents that look designed before you touch anything.
Mac / iOS / Win / Android / Web
Gains you: multi-level folders, internal links, backlinks. Same territory: minimal & fast.
$10/mo
AFFiNE
Docs and an infinite whiteboard that are the same document.
Web / Win / Mac / Linux / iOS / Android · Open source
Gains you: meeting recording, internal links, backlinks. Same territory: privacy & ownership.
$8.90/mo
Joplin
Open source, end-to-end encrypted, and it syncs wherever you tell it to.
Win / Mac / Linux / iOS / Android / Web · Open source
Gains you: multi-level folders, internal links, backlinks. Same territory: privacy & ownership.
$3/mo
Octarine
Local markdown files, a clean editor and one payment.
Mac / Win / Linux / iOS
Gains you: multi-level folders, internal links, backlinks. Same territory: privacy & ownership.
$79 once
Supernotes
Every note is a card, and cards were built to be shared.
Web / Win / Mac / Linux / iOS / Android
Gains you: multi-level folders, internal links, backlinks. Same territory: minimal & fast.
$10/mo
Still not sure?
Filter the whole directory by the one feature you cannot live without, or browse by what you need the app for.