Private alpha for macOS
One home for the notes you choose to keep.
Save a decision, deadline, or piece of context from Afternote, Codex, or Claude Code. Find it later in a new conversation or another connected tool, with the exact source attached. In this first alpha, the encrypted vault and search stay on your Mac.
No Afternote account for this alpha. Public download after private-alpha release validation.
One home for saved notes
Across conversations. Across connected tools.
Why I rebuilt it
I didn’t want AI to capture everything. I wanted it to remember what I chose.
Automatic meeting capture and cloud AI notes solve a real problem. My workflow is more deliberate: save this decision, remember that deadline, keep this piece of context. Then let me find it from wherever I work next.
The first Afternote was hosted. It worked, but it meant leaving the tool I was using and relying on a hosted system to store and process my notes so semantic search could work.
Afternote Local starts with a different boundary. Only the notes I explicitly save enter the shared vault. They remain available after a chat ends, whether I return in the same tool or move to another connected one.
Save it once. Find it in the next conversation or the next connected tool.
The loop
One note hub, wherever you work.
- 01
Save it deliberately.
Write in the native app, or tell Codex or Claude Code to remember something. Afternote only saves what you explicitly choose.
- 02
Give it one durable home.
Every saved note enters the same encrypted local vault, not the chat thread that happened to capture it. Afternote indexes it on your Mac so you can find the idea even when you do not remember the exact words.
- 03
Recall it wherever you work next.
Search in Afternote, return in a new conversation, or ask from another connected tool. Results point back to the exact saved note so you can check the answer.
Security in this alpha
Connected tools get a narrow door, not a spare key.
Codex and Claude Code receive scoped access to save notes, search them, and retrieve exact sources through separately authorized connections. They do not receive the vault key, database path, or a fallback around the broker. Access can be inspected and revoked from the app.
This is an early build, not a blanket security claim. The point is to make each boundary explicit and testable.
- Storage
- Encrypted SQLCipher vault on this Mac
- Accounts
- No Afternote account for this alpha
- Connections
- Separately authorized and revocable
- Search
- Runs on this Mac with exact citations
- Telemetry
- No telemetry leaves the Mac in this alpha
Questions
The honest version.
Can I download Afternote Local today?
Not publicly yet. The signed and notarized macOS build is in private-alpha release validation, including fresh install, upgrade, rollback, uninstall, and connector acceptance. The public download follows that work, not the other way around.
What stays on my Mac in this alpha?
The vault, embeddings, and search index stay on your Mac. The core runtime makes no non-loopback network requests. Codex and Claude Code still follow their own provider and privacy behavior when you ask them to work with retrieved text.
What can connect today?
The current private alpha has verified saving, recall, and exact-source retrieval through Codex and Claude Code. You do not need to use both: Afternote can carry notes across separate conversations in either tool. Using both demonstrates that the same note hub can also bridge tools. More connectors are coming.
What happened to the original Afternote web app?
It is still available for existing users, but I am not promoting new hosted sign-ups. Existing users can find the hosted sign-in and a direct help email in the footer if their notes are not where they expect.
Will Afternote Local be open source?
Yes. I am in the final stages of separating the local product into a clean repository before publishing it, so anyone can inspect the architecture and vet the security claims without bringing the old hosted product and its history along for the ride.
See one saved note move across tools.