OrbNote vs Driftnote

Capture the thought first. OrbNote is a chat-style notebook designed for Apple devices. Text, images, recordings, files, and checklists can all enter the same timeline like messages. You do not need to choose a folder first or design a complete structure while an idea is still forming. Put it in Quick Jot, then organize it manually or ask AI for suggestions when the right place becomes clear. Capture like messaging Every note is a message, naturally preserving its time and context. Quick Jot Not sure where something belongs? Capture it first and organize it later. AI organization · Pro AI can suggest a suitable group and Thread and explain why. Accept or ignore each suggestion, or explicitly enable automatic organization. Text, images, audio, and files Keep different types of content in the same context. Pro includes recording transcription and search across image text (OCR), attachments, and full article text. Across Apple devices Capture on iPhone, iPad, Mac, and Apple Watch, and keep everything in sync with your own iCloud account. Local-first Regular notes are stored on your devices first, with no separate OrbNote content account required. AI remains optional and processes only the content needed when you use an AI feature. Privacy and control Protect important Threads with a password (Pro) and let time-sensitive messages expire automatically (Pro). Export notes as Markdown with original attachments. Terms of Use (EULA): https://www.apple.com/legal/internet-services/itunes/dev/stdeula/

Driftnote is for the part of writing that happens before the writing — working out who is in the story, what happens, and whether any of it holds together. You tell it what you're writing: horror, romance, mystery, thriller, fantasy, science fiction, drama, comedy, adventure, or nothing in particular. The app adjusts to the answer. The questions it asks about a character in a horror story are not the ones it asks in a romance. There are five places to put things. The pile is for anything half-formed. No structure, no fields to fill in. Put a #hashtag on something and it becomes a filter you can pull on later. The cast holds characters, places, objects, and whatever is standing in the way. Each one gets a set of fields that suit what you're writing. The timeline is what happens, in the order it happens in the story's world. You can start from an existing structure if the blank page is the problem, or build it a beat at a time. The workbench is how your story works, in sections you name yourself. It suggests things. You can ignore all of them. The draft is a proper writing space — real formatting, version history for every page going back twenty states, and Markdown export when you want your words somewhere else. On privacy. Signed out, which is the default, everything stays on your device and nothing is sent anywhere. The app works with no connection at all. Signing in exists for one reason: having the same desk on more than one device. If you had already written things before signing in, it asks whether to bring them with you rather than quietly replacing them. You can download all of your work as a single file, restore from one, or delete your account and everything in it. All of that is in Settings, and none of it requires emailing anyone. On AI. There isn't any unless you turn it on and supply your own Anthropic API key. Every room, template and export works without it. Nothing you write is used to train anything. Ten themes, light and dark. Free. No subscription, no purchases, no ads, no analytics.