# Smolpad - markdown notes — Your text files in sync > Minimalist Markdown editor for plain text notes synced via iCloud. (iPhone/iPad app by BaconWorks, LLC.) - Source: https://appshunter.io/ios/app/smolpad-markdown-notes/id6792438749 (this page in markdown: same URL + `.md`) - Developer: [BaconWorks, LLC](https://appshunter.io/developer/6783126115) - Category: Productivity, Utilities - Price: Free with in-app purchases - Rating: 5.00/5 from 1 App Store ratings - Age rating: 4+ - Requires: iOS 18.0 · 76 MB - Languages: American English, French (France), German (Germany), Russian - Released: 2026-08-05 - Data updated: 2026-10-31 - Monetization: freemium ## What is Smolpad? Smolpad is a smol Markdown editor with respect for your files. Every note is a plain .md file you can open with any app, on any device, forever. Your files are your own. No database. No lock-in. No bloat. Just a tiny, fast home for your notes on Mac, iPhone, and iPad. WRITE IN MARKDOWN, BEAUTIFULLY • Syntax dims as you type, or hides away entirely with one tap • Task lists become real checkboxes. Checkboxes that check. • Headings, bold, italic, code, quotes, and tables, styled as you write • A formatting bar for common touches, plus full keyboard shortcuts • Pictures too: drag or paste one in, resize it by its corner, and it lives as a plain file beside the note YOUR FILES, ANYWHERE • Notes sync through your own iCloud Drive, included free • Open your notes folder in Finder or Files any time • Organize with folders, pins, and instant search • A Trash for deleted notes, and a history of every note's earlier versions • Find notes in Spotlight, and open them with Siri or Shortcuts • Your notes never leave your devices except to your own cloud SMOL ON PURPOSE • On the Mac, Smolpad lives in your menu bar, one hotkey away • Tear off a note into its own window when you want to stay a while • On iPhone and iPad, it opens fast and stays out of your way • Eight hand-picked fonts and a clean, quiet interface MAKE IT YOURS WITH SMOLPAD PRO • Unlimited notes (the free tier includes ten) • Dropbox, pCloud, or Google Drive sync, in a folder that belongs to you • Notepads: open any folder of Markdown files as its own notepad, an Obsidian vault or a Bear export among them • Export to PDF, HTML, or rich text, and print • Widgets on the Mac, iPhone and iPad, Lock Screen widgets on iPhone, and Smolpad on Apple Watch • Twenty-nine editor themes, from Tokyo Night to Catppuccin • Seventeen app icons and the full menu bar icon set Smolpad Pro is available as a monthly or yearly subscription, or a one-time lifetime purchase. The free tier is a real notes app, not a trial. Made by a smol team that believes plain text outlives everything. Terms of Use: https://www.apple.com/legal/internet-services/itunes/dev/stdeula/ Privacy Policy: https://smolpad.com/privacy ## Key features - Plain .md file storage - iCloud sync - Markdown syntax highlighting - Task list checkboxes - Folder organization and search - Trash and version history - Export to PDF/HTML (Pro) ## Pricing and in-app purchases Base price: Free. **Subscriptions** | Subscription | Price | Period | | --- | --- | --- | | Smolpad Pro | $14.99 | per year | | Smolpad Pro | $1.49 | per month | **One-time purchases** | Purchase | Price | Type | | --- | --- | --- | | Smolpad Pro Lifetime | $29.99 | one-time | ## Is Smolpad safe? Not enough ratings yet to assess Smolpad. ## Is Smolpad legit? Smolpad - markdown notes has limited verification signals. The AppsHunter Legitimacy Score for Smolpad is 58 out of 100 points across 7 verification signals from App Store and developer data. ## Frequently asked questions about Smolpad ### What is Smolpad? Smolpad is a minimalist Markdown editor designed for plain text notes. It stores each note as a separate .md file, ensuring your data is always accessible and not locked into a proprietary database. ### How does Smolpad sync notes? Smolpad syncs your notes using your own iCloud Drive, which is included for free. This means your files are only ever transferred to your personal cloud storage. ### What are the limitations of the free version of Smolpad? The free tier of Smolpad includes ten notes. To have unlimited notes, access to additional sync services like Dropbox, Google Drive, and pCloud, and advanced export options, you can upgrade to Smolpad Pro. ### What are the subscription options for Smolpad Pro? Smolpad Pro is available as a monthly subscription for $1.49, a yearly subscription for $14.99 with a 7-day free trial, or a one-time lifetime purchase. ### Does Smolpad have ads? No, Smolpad does not contain advertisements. The app is focused on providing a clean and distraction-free writing experience. ### What devices is Smolpad available on? Smolpad is available on Mac, iPhone, and iPad. It also offers companion apps for Apple Watch and widgets for Mac, iPhone, and iPad. ### How often is Smolpad updated? Smolpad was last updated on October 29, 2026, with version 1.4. The app is actively developed by a small team committed to plain text principles. ### Can I export my notes from Smolpad? Yes, the Pro version of Smolpad allows you to export your notes to PDF, HTML, or rich text formats, and also supports printing. ## Version history (last 5 releases) ### 1.4 — 2026-10-29 NEW • Notepads. A notepad is a folder of notes Smolpad shows on its own, with its own folders, Trash and history. On the Mac, point Smolpad at any folder on your disk, an Obsidian vault or a folder of exports, and it edits the files right there; nothing is moved or renamed on the way in. With Sync notes on, a copy travels through your cloud to your iPhone and iPad, where it appears under Notepads too. New Notepad makes a fresh one on any device, and Import from Bear brings a Bear export over with its pictures and dates. Switch with the pill at the foot of the notes list: your three latest notepads, Sync Notepads, Add New and Edit Notepads. Having more than one notepad is part of Smolpad Pro. • Keep notepads in order. Rename one you made, give it one of sixteen icons, archive it for later, and move a note or a whole folder to another notepad. When a folder you added goes missing, Smolpad says so, with Locate and Archive, instead of showing it empty, on every device. • Sync notes has a switch, in Settings > Storage. Off, notes stay on this Mac, iPhone or iPad; on, the cards pick which cloud carries them. • Notes from Obsidian and DEVONthink show their title, tags, dates and aliases from their properties. Finder tags count as tags. Sort by Date Added. • Clear Completed Tasks, in the note's file name menu on the Mac and under the title on iPhone and iPad, with Undo. Checked tasks move to the bottom of their list, unless you turn that off in Settings > Editor. • The note's title is a menu on iPhone and iPad: word count, Rename, Copy Path and Show in Files. Copy Path on the Mac (Option-Command-C) points another app, a script or an AI agent at the file. Import Files in a folder's menu and in the notepad menu. Shift-Command-M hides Markdown syntax. • Smolpad widgets on the Mac (Pro): Open Note and Recently Edited on the desktop and in Notification Center, in your editor theme. Task boxes check right there, and in the iPhone and iPad widget too. • Quick Look for Markdown on the Mac: select any .md file in Finder and press Space. • From the Home Screen: New Note, Today's Note and Search, beside Save Clipboard. Drag several notes at once on the Mac. The Table button asks for the size. • Empty daily notes can tidy themselves away: Settings > General > Daily Note, Never by default. • On iPhone and iPad, notes keep syncing after you leave Smolpad (Dropbox, pCloud, Google Drive). When syncing needs you, a small amber dot appears beside the note and says why. • A new upgrade screen that names what you tapped, and a heads-up at two notes left on iPhone and iPad. CHANGED • Deleting a note says what happens to its pictures, and Delete, Keep Pictures leaves them in place when some would go with the note. • The Default notepad is now called Smolpad, and Store notes in is now Sync notes. The Mac popup resizes from its bottom corners, and the sidebar's buttons have new places. FIXED • On iPhone with iOS 18, going back from a note stays on the list, and the buttons above the list are back. • Fewer conflicted copies with pCloud and Google Drive: the Mac sends what you typed the moment the panel closes and checks for your other devices' edits every time it opens. • The Mac catches up after sleep and after a lost connection. A folder no longer shows up empty on the Mac. Editing a note keeps its Finder tags. ### 1.3.9 — 2026-10-17 NEW • A Trash for deleted notes. A deleted note goes to the Trash, under your folders. Touch and hold it there (right-click on the Mac) to Restore it or Delete Now; Empty Trash clears it all. The Trash is a folder inside your notes folder, so it syncs, and its notes don't count toward the free plan's ten. • Note history. Smolpad keeps earlier versions of every note, so words lost to a sync, a slip or a change of mind can come back. Choose History on a note to see its versions by date and time and Restore one. A version is kept when you come back to a note, before a large deletion, when the note goes to the Trash, and just before a sync from another device replaces what you wrote. Versions are plain text files in a hidden folder inside your notes folder, so they sync too. History is free. • Home Screen widgets (Pro). Open Note, on iPhone, shows a note of your choice. On iPhone and iPad, Quick Actions is four tiles, New Note, Search, Daily Note and Save Clipboard, and Recently Edited lists the notes you touched last. • Tiny5, a pixel font, in Settings > Editor > Font: every letter on a grid five pixels tall, with its own bold and italic. • Check for changes yourself. Pull the note list down on iPhone and iPad, or click the bubble in the Mac's footer (Command-R), and Smolpad asks your storage for anything new. • Select several notes. On the Mac, Command-click and Shift-click, then right-click to move, pin, archive, export or trash them together. On iPhone and iPad, Select Notes in the Sort menu puts a circle on every row, with Move, Export and Delete at the foot. • Clippings can carry their source (Mac). With Include the page title and link on (Settings > General > Shortcut), text taken from a web page lands in today's note as a quote with a link to the page. • Export a note as Markdown (Pro), beside PDF, HTML and rich text, to keep a copy wherever you like; a selection exports the same way. • Hold Command-Q to quit (Mac). A quick Command-Q puts the panel away; holding it quits. Settings > General > Popup has the switch. • iPhone Duo. Unfolded, the note list sits beside the note as on iPad; folded, Smolpad is the iPhone it always was. Where iOS keeps a bar along the edge, the buttons move into it, Search nearest your thumb. • Anonymous usage statistics. Once a day, Smolpad counts which settings and features are in use, so we can tell what to improve. It never sends your notes or anything you type, and Settings > General > Share anonymous usage statistics turns it off. CHANGED • The panel torn off into a window has the Mac's own window buttons, Minimize, Zoom and Enter Full Screen in its menus, and the formatting bar floating over the note, as on iPad. FIXED • A note edited on another device updates on an iPhone or iPad that is already open (iCloud); it used to wait for a relaunch. • A note's pictures go with it to another folder, to the Trash, and back. • A note you move or rename stays on Dropbox, pCloud and Google Drive the whole time, and hidden folders there, like Obsidian's, are left alone. • Add to Today's Note in the Services menu leaves you in the app you were in (Mac). • Also: Backspace at the start of a task removes its checkbox, a shared web page links to the right address even with parentheses or spaces in it, and the note list's dates keep up. ### 1.3.8 — 2026-10-06 NEW • An emoji picker. Type a colon and two letters, like :ap, and a list of matching emoji appears under the cursor, narrowing as you type. It finds emoji by meaning as well as by name: :fruit lists the fruit, :happy the smiling faces, and a small typo is forgiven. On the Mac, the arrow keys move through the list and Return or Tab picks one; on iPhone and iPad, tap one. • Acknowledgments. Settings > About has a new page for the fonts, emoji data and sounds in Smolpad that other people made and shared, each with its license. • On iPhone and iPad, Feedback, Release Notes and the new Newsletter row in Settings > About open inside Smolpad, with a Done button to come back, instead of sending you to the browser. CHANGED • The notes list shows titles on their own, so more notes fit. Settings > General > Notes > Show last edited date in notes list brings the dates back, and the choice follows you to your other devices. If you already use Smolpad, the switch is on after the update and your list looks the way it did. • An emoji at the start of a title stays out of the file's name. A note titled Groceries with an apple in front is saved as Groceries.md: the emoji is in the note and beside its row in the list. A note you named yourself now shows its emoji there too. • Sorting by Title ignores an emoji at the start of a title. FIXED • A new Mac keeps Smolpad in the Dock. A new install showed Smolpad in the Dock and the menu bar the first time it opened, and in the menu bar alone from the second launch on. If your Dock icon went missing this way, Settings > General > Show Smolpad in brings it back: pick Menu Bar & Dock. ### 1.3.7 — 2026-09-29 NEW • Tables. A Markdown table reads as a grid as you write: Tab moves between cells, Return adds a row, and the Table button on the formatting bar starts one. A table pasted from a chat lines up on arrival. With Hide Markdown syntax on it draws as a real table, in one of four styles from Settings > Editor > Customize Editor. • pCloud and Google Drive sync (Smolpad Pro), beside iCloud and Dropbox in Settings > Storage. Connect copies your iCloud notes over, then keeps them as plain Markdown files in a Smolpad folder of your own, synced both ways. Neither service shows Smolpad anything else. • Smolpad on Apple Watch (Smolpad Pro). Read your notes, check off tasks, start a New Note by dictation, or Add Text to a note. The watch works through your iPhone and keeps your changes while the iPhone is out of reach. Two complications: Open Smolpad, and Open Note for a note of your choice. • Lock Screen widgets on iPhone (Smolpad Pro): Search, Daily Note, Open Note, New Note and Open Smolpad. Open Note also comes wide, showing the note's first lines. • Shortcuts, Siri and Spotlight. Five actions, Open Today's Note, Open Note, New Note, Append to Note and Search Notes, work in Shortcuts and with Siri with no setup. Your notes appear in Spotlight, and Siri with Apple Intelligence knows which note is open. Opening and searching are free; New Note and Append to Note need Smolpad Pro. • Export (Smolpad Pro): PDF, HTML or Rich Text, a whole note or a selection, plus Copy as Rich Text, Print, and Send to Apple Notes on the Mac or Share… on iPhone and iPad. • Your settings follow you to every device on your iCloud account: daily note, images, sorting, editor and themes. Settings > General > Sync settings with iCloud turns it off. • More Markdown: quotes with a bar in your accent color, nested bullets as circles and squares, footnotes, definition lists, ==highlights==, subscript and superscript, colored code in nine languages, and [[note links]] that open another note. Type :tent: and it becomes the tent emoji. A title that starts with an emoji shows it as the note's icon. • Also new: Archive in a note's menu, or on a swipe left; on the Mac, Control-Option-Command-T adds the selected text, or the clipboard, to today's note, and a shortcut of your own detaches Smolpad from the menu bar; three short date formats for daily notes, which now move with their folder; on iPhone and iPad, touch and hold the plus button for a new note. CHANGED • A long list item wraps under its own text, not back under its bullet, number or checkbox. FIXED • Smolpad opens without freezing. Notes load in the background, so a big library, or notes iCloud has not downloaded yet, no longer hold the app on an empty list. • Sync no longer makes conflicted copies of your own edits after a dropped connection. A note that syncs while you edit it shows the synced text, and your last edit on iPhone and iPad is sent when you leave. When two devices truly clash, iCloud now keeps both versions, one as "(conflicted copy)". • Leaving a note no longer crashes some iPhones, a long note no longer flashes a second cursor as you type, and the caret lands where you tap beside hidden Markdown. ### 1.3.6 — 2026-09-15 NEW • A daily note, one per day. Turn on Daily note in Settings > General and Smolpad keeps one note per calendar day in a Daily folder, named by its date in the format you pick from eight. On the Mac, the Shortcut group in Settings > General gains Set keyboard shortcut to open today's note: press it anywhere and today's note comes to the front, created if need be. • A calendar for daily notes. With Daily note on, the note list gets a calendar button. Days that have a note carry a dot, today sits on a tinted disc, and tapping any day opens its note, creating it if there is none. • Add to Today's Note from any app on the Mac. Select text anywhere, right-click or open the app's Services menu, and choose Add to Today's Note in Smolpad. The text lands under today's heading. • Smolpad can offer what you just copied. Turn on Enable clipboard notification in Settings > Editor > Customize Editor, and opening Smolpad with new text or a picture on the clipboard shows a small card asking Paste clipboard? New Note puts it in a new note; while your cursor is in a note, Yes pastes it right there. The card leaves on its own after 20 seconds. On the Mac, Settings > General > Notes has Always paste clipboard into a new note. • Save the clipboard from the Home Screen. On iPhone and iPad, long-press the Smolpad icon and choose Save Clipboard: whatever you copied, text or a picture, becomes a new note and Smolpad opens on it. • Import a folder of notes. Settings > Storage > Import Notes has an Import notes button: pick a folder and Smolpad copies the Markdown and text files at its top level into your notes. • Settings > Storage says what iCloud is doing. A line under the storage cards says whether iCloud is on and every note is synced, whether notes are uploading or downloading, or, in amber, that notes are staying on this device. • Tab nests a list item. On a bullet, numbered, or task line, Tab indents the item one level and Shift-Tab brings it back out. Numbered lists renumber to match. On iPhone and iPad this is for hardware keyboards. • Paste a link onto selected text on the Mac. Select some words, copy a web address, and press Command-V: the words become a link to it. iPhone and iPad already worked this way. • Two new editor themes, Doki Sayori and Doki Vanilla. Twenty-nine themes in all. • Always on top for the torn-off window on the Mac, three ways: the switch in Settings > Editor > Customize Editor, the note list's right-click menu, or the pin at the end of the window's status bar. • About shows the build number next to the version, and a Release Notes link opens smolpad.com/release-notes. CHANGED • Settings are grouped under headings: Launch Configuration, Popup, and Notes in General; Import Notes in Storage; Customize Editor in Editor. • The popup appears instantly on the Mac. Settings > General > Popup has Animate popup, off by default, for anyone who wants the old motion back. • The Settings and Search buttons float over the note list, and the list scrolls beneath them. FIXED • The Mac joins iCloud without a relaunch. Turning on iCloud Drive, or signing in to iCloud, while Smolpad is open now copies your notes into iCloud right away. And if iCloud Drive is slow to answer at launch, Smolpad asks again on its own. • A missing picture says so. A note whose picture file has been moved or deleted now shows a small frame with the picture icon and the file's name, instead of a blank line. ## Apps similar to Smolpad | App | Rating | Price | Category | | --- | --- | --- | --- | | [Anchu: Notes & Tasks](https://appshunter.io/ios/app/anchu-notes-and-tasks/id6808175189) | — | Free | Productivity | | [pocketbrief](https://appshunter.io/ios/app/pocketbrief/id6761393486) | — | Free | Productivity | | [Note Hoard: Smart Bookmarks](https://appshunter.io/ios/app/note-hoard-smart-bookmarks/id6758999854) | — | Free | Productivity | | [Clipwell: Snippets & Clips](https://appshunter.io/ios/app/clipwell-snippets-and-clips/id6799681709) | — | Free | Productivity | | [Adoluna Shift](https://appshunter.io/ios/app/adoluna-shift/id6785129507) | — | Free | Productivity | | [HipMark - Markdown Editor](https://appshunter.io/ios/app/hipmark-markdown-editor/id6775708874) | — | Free | Productivity | --- *Data collected daily from the US App Store and indexed by [AppsHunter](https://appshunter.io/). User reviews are verbatim App Store reviews. Ratings, prices and chart positions refresh continuously; this snapshot is from 2026-10-31.*