openote vs Keepout

openote — Markdown notes with free sync. No account. No subscription. Other note apps charge a yearly fee just to sync your own devices. openote syncs iPhone, iPad and Mac through your iCloud Drive — free, with no account to create. Your notes stay plain .md files. Open them in the Files app or any Markdown editor, and take them anywhere. No proprietary format, no lock-in. --- WHY OPENOTE Free iCloud sync Notes sync through iCloud Drive on your own Apple account. No sign-up, no subscription. Plain Markdown files Every note is a standard .md file. Front matter, checklists and [[wiki links]] are kept exactly as you wrote them. Safe across devices If a note changes on another device while you're editing, openote keeps both versions instead of silently overwriting one. Your last words are saved even if you switch apps or quit right away. Mermaid diagrams Flowcharts, sequence diagrams and more render live from Markdown. Start from a template, pinch to zoom, tap to edit the code. Rendering works offline. On-device AI On devices with Apple Intelligence, summarize a note, get tag suggestions, or turn a sentence into a diagram. It runs entirely on your device — nothing is sent to a server. --- FEATURES Editor - Rich Markdown editing, with a source mode when you want the raw text - Checklists, tables and code blocks - Auto-save - Word and character count Organize - Folders and #tags with autocomplete - [[Wiki links]] between notes - Full-text search in English, Korean and Japanese Sync & files - iPhone, iPad and Mac via iCloud Drive - Browse your notes in the Files app - Export a note as PDF Shortcuts & Siri - Create, open and search notes from Shortcuts and Siri - Notes appear in Spotlight search --- PRIVACY - No account, no email - No tracking - Your notes stay in your iCloud and on your devices - AI runs on your device Everything is free. openote has no in-app purchases. openote — Your notes, your files.

Keepout is a private notes app for iPhone and iPad. Your writing stays on your device, encrypted at rest, with local tools for connecting and understanding ideas. PRIVATE BY DESIGN • AES-256-GCM encryption protects every note at rest. • Your vault key stays in this device's non-synchronizing Keychain. • Opaque filenames keep note titles and links out of the file system. • There is no account, cloud sync, analytics, remote prompt processing, or plaintext search index. CONNECTED KNOWLEDGE • Link notes with familiar double-bracket wiki links. • Follow backlinks and suggested related notes. • Explore an interactive knowledge graph built with Apple's local sentence embeddings. • Search decrypted notes in memory while the vault is unlocked. LOCAL AI • Ask questions, summarize a note, and suggest connections without sending note text to a server. • Use Apple Foundation Models on supported devices. • Choose the optional MLX engine for local inference. Its compact model downloads once on first use; inference then stays on your device. FOCUSED WRITING • Open the transient action bar from the toolbar or with Command-K on a hardware keyboard. • Type / in the editor for headings, lists, tasks, quotes, code blocks, dividers, and links. • Switch to a centered typewriter view that hides the side columns and softly fades the page edges. • Navigate with touch or hardware-keyboard shortcuts on iPad. • Markdown syntax and link destinations stay visually quiet until the caret enters them. Keepout stores each encrypted note in a .md file so your vault remains a collection of Markdown documents without exposing their contents at rest.