Open source notes projects
Every project in the registry tagged notes, ranked by real GitHub adoption.
Docs, whiteboards, and databases in one privacy-first workspace
Self-hosted timeline for quick notes, logs, and snippets
Zero-knowledge encrypted notes that sync across all devices
CLI and local web plain text note‑taking, bookmarking, and archiving with linking, tagging, filtering, search, Git versioning & syncing, Pandoc conversion, + mo
HedgeDoc - Ideas grow better together
Secure, encrypted notes for your digital life
The cross-platform open-source app built for handwriting
Fast and beautiful note-taking app written in C++. Write down your thoughts.
Mobile first Note Taking integrated with Git
📚 The open-source, offline-first Notion, Obsidian & Confluence alternative. Advanced Markdown, multi-tenant teams, OIDC/SSO, and local S3 backups. Deploy in on
Write Markdown with code assist and intelligence in the comfort of your favourite editor.
A self-hosted, database-less note taking web app that utilises a flat folder of markdown files for storage.
🎨 Powerful, minimalistic, cross-platform, opensource note-taking app
Local-first notes app with no cloud, no AI, no tracking
Git powered terminal-based todo/note manager -- markdown note page per task. Single binary!
Clean, distraction-free note-taking with local storage
Powerful note-taking without the hassle.
Neovim plugin for zk
Beautiful Kanban boards with seamless payment integration
End-to-end encrypted visual note-taking tool with deep page navigation.
开源自托管笔记与私有知识库，支持 Markdown/富文本、AI 写作、思维导图、任务管理、全文搜索、多级笔记本和 Docker 一键部署。
The Tangent monorepo.
Transcribe meetings and voice notes with local AI, no bots required
Self-hosted sticky notes with better organization
Related tags
Frequently asked questions
How many open source notes projects are there?
This registry tracks 29 projects tagged notes, with 240,372 GitHub stars between them. The most-adopted is Affine at 74,063 stars.
Are these notes projects free to use?
Yes — 28 of the 29 carry an explicit open-source licence across 5 distinct licences, so there is no licence fee. Where a project also sells a hosted or enterprise version, the self-hosted path remains free.
Which notes project should I choose?
The list above is ranked by GitHub stars, but stars measure attention rather than fit. Check three things on each card: the licence (permissive versus copyleft), the language it is written in, and the last-push date — a high-star project that has not been pushed in a year is a liability.
Are these notes projects still maintained?
25 of the 29 were pushed in the last 90 days, and every card shows its exact last-push date so you can see the rest. Sort your shortlist by that date before committing to a migration.