a simplenote alternative

shizumu is a simplenote alternative for people who liked how little was in the way and wanted a way back to what they wrote.

how the two behave

simplenote is plain text with tags and an account, synced everywhere and free. its virtue is that nothing is in the way, and its limit is the same thing: a long list of notes, a search box, and no structure to lean on when you come back a month later.

shizumu keeps the empty start and changes the coming back. no account at all, the writing on your device, and pins that point into the page where a thought happened.

what you keep, and what you leave behind

simplenote exports json and text, so everything moves. tags do not come across, because there are none here. what stands in for them is a trail: a page that belongs to a longer thread, with the pins you kept there coming back when you open it.

what a page does instead

every day starts empty. you write to think, you pin what matters, and everything else stays in memory, searchable. the page is not plain text either: / gives a table, a chart, an outline or a block of code, and @ reaches a page, a pin or a trail. plain to open, not plain to write in.

sync, without an account

sync is optional and end-to-end encrypted, free for two devices, and the relay is yours to run if you want: how to sync a journal between devices.

try before you move

the app runs in your browser with a few weeks of writing already in it: try it. also worth a look: a google keep alternative and a notesnook alternative.

what holds on every platform

shizumu is free, on linux, android, and windows. your writing stays on your device. sync is optional and end-to-end encrypted: the relay holds what it cannot read, and neither can we. the app and the relay are open source: apache-2.0 on the client, agpl-3.0-or-later on the relay.

it will not write for you, because the writing is the thinking.

try it in your browser download