Apple Journal App

Software
1

The Apple Journal app is one I’m still trying to get into using.

I turned on the notifications to do just that. It found them annoying so I turned them off. Why is journaling such a long stretch.

I used Day One for years with a subscription as it would allow me to record my voice and then transcribe it somewhat successfully.

I don’t see the Apple Journal allowing for import or export of entries in any way.

Has anyone come across that?

Are you liking the Apple Journal app?

I suspect with Apple Intelligence it could really be a powerful journaling tool. I would also love an iPad app and find it strange there isn’t one already tbh

2

There is no import to Journal. And no iPad app, as the Suggestions API that brings up suggestions to journal about from content in your apps is iOS-only.

It got very little attention for iOS 18 outside of in-app search and bringing in the Mental
Health tracking that was already in iOS.

4 Likes
3

I never kept a journal, only log books. Now I look at them and wish I had been more descriptive when I can’t remember someone’s last name, etc.

4

I’ve never caught the journalling bug. Winifred Holtby (1930s English author and friend of Vera Brittain) claimed that using a “commonplace book” (i.e. a journal) resulted in her forgetting things both trivial and vital. But it is Saul Bellow who delivered the coup de grâce to any idea of my ever journalling

Socrates said, ‘The unexamined life is not worth living.’ My revision is ‘But the examined life makes you wish you were dead.’

2 Likes
5

Apple’s Journal app has spurred me to journal more… in another app. I was already using Diarly, but kept the notifications active for Apple’s journal app. That has reminded me a few times to add something, which I put into Diarly.

I use Diarly how I see many of my friends using Facebook, since I feel weird about announcing my life on Facebook (that’s just me). I post photos in Diarly with a blurb of what I’ve been up to with my family, because although I don’t like doing it semi-publicly, I do like having a log of what we’ve done to look back on. I don’t use it to sort through personal thoughts or feelings.

3 Likes
7

I love that you’re using Journal’s notifications to trigger behaviour in another app :laughing: I doubt that’s what any app developer hopes for, but it’s a great way to make tech work for you!

1 Like
8

I find it amusing how I am apparently not worried of having all my photos and files on iCloud but consider it unacceptable to lock my journal entries into Apple’s walled garden.

1 Like
9

I’ve kept journals/notebooks/logs/diaries (the nature changes) since I was 17 so I was interested in the Apple Journal app (I hadn’t used a previous dedicated app), but I think I went in it once and was not very tempted and haven’t gone back in it since. The iPhone limitation is a big one for me though. My work device is a Mac but my primary “life” device is my iPad really - I only use my iPhone for calls and quick access on the go. If I was going to use a journaling app (any) it would need to be on iPad at least, but ideally Mac too.

Nowadays I keep daily notes in text files and I’m mostly happy with this (though I miss not having a reason to writing in notebooks as much). I don’t need photo support though, just a place to type words that is easily accessible and has a reliable search.

10

But it would potentially be more difficult to move years of Apple Journal entries fully intact to another app than to move files from one cloud service to another.

1 Like