Fleeting Thoughts vs Metis
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
Fleeting Thoughts
Capture thoughts privately with voice, text, scans, videos, and files in a unified timeline. Your data stays on your device or chosen cloud storage, with no accounts or tracking. Edit, tag, and export your notes easily.
- Unified timeline for voice, text, scans, video, and files
- On-device transcription and Apple Intelligence cleanup
- Private data storage (device, iCloud, or Files app)
- Video trimming, reframing, and image cropping
- Document scanning with text extraction
- Tagging and filtering for organization
- Markdown or JSON export options
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Fleeting Thoughts is a private capture pipeline for the agentic era. Save ideas, notes, links, screenshots, scans, PDFs and voice thoughts the moment they appear, as plain files you control, ready for the notes apps, workflows and AI agents you choose. Use it when you want a fast private place to save something now and organize it later. Start with a quick voice note, paste text, share in a link, scan a page, import a file, or capture from Apple Watch. Everything lands in one clean timeline you control. - YOUR DATA, YOUR CHOICE Every thought is saved as a plain, readable file, on your iPhone or in a folder you choose. Use those files with your notes app, your own database, your local agents or the AI assistant you prefer, or keep them just for yourself. Nothing requires an agent or a subscription, and your data stays yours whatever you use next. - CAPTURE FAST Tap the mic to record, type a note, paste from the clipboard, scan a page, import a photo or file, or share content into Fleeting Thoughts from other apps. - BUILT FOR THE MOMENT The app is designed for quick capture first. Save the thought, hear the confirmation, and move on. You can clean it up later. - TAGS THAT STAY SIMPLE Use lightweight tags to keep ideas, links, health notes, project thoughts, and other captures separated without turning capture into a filing task. - MEDIA THAT STAYS USEFUL Keep original images, scans, screenshots, videos, audio, and PDFs attached to the thought that created them. Preview, copy, share, export, trim, crop, or remove extra attachments when needed. - PDF READER COMPANION Open saved PDFs in a focused reader, resume where you left off, bookmark a page, save a page as an image, clip selected text, and add page notes back into the original thought. - APPLE WATCH CAPTURE Capture from your wrist when your phone is not in your hand. Watch recordings keep going while you use other apps, then arrive in your iPhone timeline, transcribed. - SEARCH AND EXPORT Search your timeline, copy individual thoughts, export selected groups, and use iPhone Spotlight to find saved thoughts from outside the app. - LOCAL-FIRST BY DEFAULT No account required. No tracking. Your captures stay private and local unless you choose to share or export them. You can also choose a folder for readable saved files. - ONE PURCHASE, EVERY PLATFORM Universal Purchase includes iPhone, Apple Watch, and Mac. Each app is designed for its own device: iPhone for capture on the go, Apple Watch for wrist capture, and Mac for desktop dictation. Fleeting Thoughts is for people who think faster than they can organize: builders, writers, researchers, students, and anyone who needs to save useful things before they disappear.
Metis
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Metis is a native Markdown editor and local-first knowledge base. Your notes are just .md files in a folder you own - Metis is a fast, beautiful, native view over them. No lock-in, no proprietary format, no account required to write. WRITE IN LIVE PREVIEW A clean Obsidian-style editor styles your Markdown as you type - headings, bold, lists, quotes and code - while keeping the raw syntax one tap away. It feels like writing in a document, not in code. On iPad it's a full three-pane workspace with hardware-keyboard shortcuts. CONNECT YOUR IDEAS Link any two notes with [[wiki links]]. Backlinks appear automatically, so you always see what references the note you're reading. An interactive link graph shows your whole knowledge base at a glance - zoom, pan, and drag nodes to explore the connections. READ BEAUTIFULLY Reading mode renders the full document: headings, tables, task lists, images, syntax-highlighted code, Mermaid diagrams, and real math (LaTeX) rendered natively - no web view. ORGANIZE YOUR WAY Tag anything with #tags, group notes into folders, and see typed properties (status, owner, due...) that live as YAML front matter and are preserved as you edit. A fast switcher and full-text search get you anywhere instantly. ON-DEVICE AI (Apple Intelligence) Summarize a note, suggest tags or related links, and ask your whole vault a question - all running privately on your device. AI is optional; the app is fully functional without it. SYNC ACROSS YOUR DEVICES Keep your vault in iCloud and the same notes are on your Mac, iPad and iPhone - still as plain .md files you can open anywhere. Edits sync in the background, and Metis helps you resolve conflicts if two devices change the same note. LOCK WHAT MATTERS Any note can be locked with your notes password and opened with Face ID or Touch ID. Locked notes are encrypted on disk and stay encrypted in iCloud - and they're kept out of search and previews. PRIVATE AND YOURS Everything stays in plain files on your device. No tracking, no cloud lock-in. Open the same folder in any other Markdown editor whenever you like. Import an existing folder of notes (from Obsidian or anywhere) and Metis just works. ONE PURCHASE, ALL YOUR DEVICES A single one-time purchase unlocks Metis Pro on your Mac, iPad and iPhone - no subscription. Try everything free for 7 days. Metis is made by Empiric Apps. Questions or feedback? contact@empiricapps.com
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is price: Metis at Free against Fleeting Thoughts's $9.99. Metis also leads on update cadence (every 2 days vs every 5 days) and iOS requirement (18.0 vs 26.0). Fleeting Thoughts's advantage is in-app purchases (none vs 1). On ads and device support 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
Metis is free to download; Fleeting Thoughts costs $9.99 up front. Metis sells 1 one-off in-app purchase. Fleeting Thoughts asks for nothing beyond the download.
Fleeting Thoughts ships an update every 5 days, Metis every 2 days. Both last shipped on October 16, 2026.
| Parameter | Fleeting Thoughts | Metis |
|---|---|---|
| Price | $9.99 | Free — better |
| Rating | 5.0 (5 ratings) — better | — |
| Positive reviews | 100.0% of reviews | — |
| Number of ratings | 5 — better | — |
| Update frequency | Every 5 days | Every 2 days — better |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | No — better | Yes |
| Monetization | Paid | — |
| Devices | iPhone, Mac, Apple Watch — better | iPhone, iPad |
| Requires iOS | 26.0 | 18.0 — better |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 10 MB | 14 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | Dylan Russell | Burlac Mihail |
In-app purchases
Fleeting Thoughts
No in-app purchases
Metis
- Metis Pro$14.99









