Diary vs Thinky
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
Diary
This app provides a secure and beautiful space to record your thoughts, plans, and life moments. Protect your entries with a password and enjoy a customizable interface with features like image support and PDF export.
- Password protection with PIN
- Add/edit/remove images
- Search functionality
- Export entries to PDF
- Customizable color and font styles
- Reminders
- Auto-lock for privacy
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Secret thoughts and moments should always remain secret and a private diary should always be intimate, beautiful and safe. With that in mind, we dedicated our efforts to create a simple and beautiful diary application that helps you lock your secrets with your own password. Use this diary and put down all your thoughts or even future plans and follow them as the time passes. Make it your trustworthy friend who never judges you and who's always there for you. A good diary required good features, so here are some of the great features especially created for you: EASY TO USE & BEAUTIFUL - very easy to use yet very comprehensive - beautiful view off all your notes right on the main screen - easy navigation between your diary entries - image add/edit/remove functionality - image library with great gallery view - great overview of your daily entries - quick entry add, edit & delete - beautiful emojis(emoticos) - highlight your mood and feelings - search functionality - quickly & easily search through your journal - export to PDF functionality - save all your entries whenever you want SAFE & PRIVATE - PASSWORD PROTECTED - password lock functionality to keep your secret save - 4 digit PIN code - functionality for password update, recovery and removal - auto lock after more than 5 minutes of inactivity CUSTOMIZABLE - multiple color styles from which you can choose - multiple font styles - customizable font-size - reminders functionality OTHER COOL FEATURES - data reset functionality - beautiful design - can be easily used as a diet journal or even travel diary - totally free Regardless you want to write your love story or you just want to write down your thoughts and moments from your life, we hope this diary will turn out to be your best friend and confidant. Enjoy your life and create amazing stories!
Thinky
This app offers a secure and simple way to journal your thoughts and feelings. It automatically classifies your mood, provides writing prompts, and allows for cloud backup. Track your emotional patterns with visual graphs and set reminders to build a consistent journaling habit.
- Automatic mood classification
- End-to-end encryption
- Writing prompts
- Cloud backup and sync
- Photo attachments
- Daily reminders
- Visual mood graph
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Say hello to effortless journaling with Thinky, the beautifully simple and secure free journal. Take the guess work out of your thoughts and feelings as automatic mood classification tracks life’s ups and downs, leaving you time to focus on what really matters. Start the habit of a lifetime with Thinky, with your wellbeing at heart. More Thinky features: - Safely tuck your thoughts away with our state-of-the-art end-to-end encryption, keeping your private feelings just that: private. - Not sure where to start? Thinky’s writing prompts will help you focus on your wellbeing and remove that blank-page fear. - Create your free account to securely backup and sync your entries to the cloud - Add a splash of colour to your timeline and bring your posts to life with a photo, perfect for those times when words aren't enough. - Complete your post in a few seconds thanks to our simple, no-fuss interface, perfect for journaling on-the-go. - Never miss an entry: build the habit of daily journaling with reminders and streaks to incentivise you to keep up your practice. - Take the guess work out of your emotions and let Thinky’s automatic mood classification do all the hard work for you. - With each post, grow your bespoke visual mood graph and see how your mood ebbs and flows over time. - Take a moment for reflection, and ask Thinky to remind you of special posts at a future date. - Search your entries quickly and easily and see if you can spot patterns in your thoughts. - See in the dark with Dark Mode, perfect for late night journaling. - Keep your journal private with the Face ID lock. Now is the time to focus on you: download Thinky, your intuitive mindfulness companion.
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is in-app purchases: Diary at none against Thinky's 4. Diary also leads on ratings volume (1.7K vs 95). Thinky's advantage is update cadence (every 2 weeks vs every 5 months) and iOS requirement (10.0 vs 12.0). On price, rating, review sentiment and ads there is nothing between them.
Scored on Price · Rating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings · Update frequency · Ads · In-app purchases · Monetization · Best chart rank · Devices · Requires iOS
Both are free to download. Thinky sells 4 one-off in-app purchases. Diary asks for nothing beyond the download.
Thinky holds the better App Store score, 4.7 against 4.5. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: Diary has 1.7K ratings behind it against 95, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews point the same way: 81% of Diary's written reviews are positive against 84% of Thinky's.
Diary ships an update every 5 months, Thinky every 2 weeks. The most recent releases landed on November 2, 2026 and November 3, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | Diary | Thinky |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free |
| Rating | 4.5 (1.7K ratings) | 4.7 (95 ratings) — better |
| Positive reviews | 80.9% of reviews | 84.3% of reviews — better |
| Number of ratings | 1.7K — better | 95 |
| Update frequency | Every 5 months | Every 2 weeks — better |
| Ads | Yes | Yes |
| In-app purchases | No — better | Yes |
| Monetization | Free with in-app purchases | Free with in-app purchases |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad, iPod — better | iPhone, iPod |
| Requires iOS | 12.0 | 10.0 — better |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 28 MB | 49 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | Aurel Criste | Thinky Ltd |
Customer experience
Diary
Thinky
User reviews
Diary
From 1.7K App Store ratingsWhat we love
- 🚀 Awesome app
- 🔒 Password protected
- 👍 Customizable font, color, and theme
- 💡 Ability to add photos
- 💡 Ability to set reminders
Room to improve
- 🐛 Entries disappear without warning
- 🐛 Password issues, unable to reset
- 🐛 Scrolling/jumping text when writing longer entries
- 🔋 Excessive ads
- 🐛 Unable to recover deleted entries
Thinky
From 95 App Store ratingsWhat we love
- 👍 Simple and easy to use
- ✨ Visually appealing design
- 🧠 Helps with self-reflection
- 🔒 Passcode protection available
- 💡 Tracks moods effectively
Room to improve
- 📝 Strict word limit (250 characters)
- 🤔 Difficulty navigating to past dates
- 📱 No iPad specific version
- 🔔 Reminders not always working
- ❓ Privacy key issues preventing login
Bugs and requests
Diary
Reported bugs
4 issues- Password not working consistently
- Entries disappearing or not saving properly
- Scrolling/jumping text when writing longer entries
- Inability to recover deleted entries
Requested features
6 requests- Backup and sync across devices
- More customization options (fonts, colors, backgrounds)
- Ability to export entries
- Night mode/dark theme
- Voice-to-text entry
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- Ability to organize entries by tags or categories
Thinky
Reported bugs
3 issues- App crashes when navigating to past dates
- Privacy key not working for login
- Wind down and bedtime alerts not working
Requested features
14 requests- Increase word limit
- Ability to export entries
- Tagging entries for search
- Add a return button for new lines
- Bullet points feature
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- Edit past entries
- Add more features and color customization
- Ability to add entries to specific dates
- iPad version
- Pin separate from phone for access
- Dark mode
- Advanced analytics
- Change daily entry order (asc/desc)
- Previews for entries
In-app purchases
Diary
No in-app purchases
Thinky
- Coffee-sized tip$0.99
- Sandwich-sized tip$2.99
- Pizza-sized tip$4.99
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- A very generous tip$9.99









