Day One 4+

Templates save me

I would skip journaling for months, because coming up with something to say everyday started to seem artificial. But creating Templates to prompt my thinking really helps me to keep my journaling habit solid. Everyday I have a prompt asking me what I woke up thinking about. When we wake up things are always on our mind.. some personal, some business, random stuff that bothered you during the night.. whatever. In the afternoon I have a template that prompts me to report how the day went, or what could have been better. I don't always do this everyday, but somedays this prompt catches me at just the right moment and I share a little something. Another best practice is just to share one picture of the day, and talk about it. And of course, the reason you might do all of this, go back and review your entries from past months/years.. etc. You discover so much about yourself. "Why did I think like that?" "Oh look, I still think like this.." "Should I change that thing about my life.. here it is years later and I'm still 'working' on it".. These are the questions that you encounter that really helps you analyze your life, gives you an outlet for gratitude, creates and opportunity for growth. Do it! Journal! It's healthy and wonderful. Thanks Day One for a great product. I tried to switch back to paper, but my electronic journaling is a part of my life. I accept it, learn from it, and can't imagine a life without it.

Does what it says on the tin!

As someone a little too focused on productivity and self-realization tools, I’ve tried a lot of ways of journaling, blogging, publishing, and keeping it to myself. Day One is nice and clean - it’s pretty full-featured, but also lets you turn off, or even better, ignore, features that you don’t want. I’m appreciating being able to write in Markdown, but not having to, as that’s my mode in several wikis that I use for work.

Several years and several versions in, I’m really appreciating the line that Day One walks. It has a lot of features, but they don’t get in the way of my fairly simple use. And yet, every few months, I find some feature that helps me write more consistently, more quickly, or expand what I’m writing. The latest discovery was coming to understand the different views, and how satisfying it is to see a long streak in the calendar view. I’d only used timeline view before, but when I looked at the calendar - boom! Easy to use and it helps me write more.

I bought Day One (Classic) and wasn’t sure about the upgrade for a while. The new interface is a little more intuitive, and some of the new features are nice. I like multiple images, and I like having the “a year ago” feature without the data being in someone else’s—FB’s—control. I’m not keen on the switch to subscription, but as a developer I understand the tension between ongoing improvements and one-time purchases. The overall cost is still impressively low!

Five Years Deep, Still Five Stars

I instantly thought it was the best when the app was first released some five years ago. Five years later, it is still the reigning champ in the world of journaling. Flexible, powerful, uncluttered user experience, great customer service, reliable and constantly tweeked and improved to make it better- these are all the reasons this is worth your money. I definitely don’t prefer the subscription model that is emerging as the app industry-standard, but that’s not necessarily Day One’s problem. I get it- you’ve got to figure out a way to keep the lights on in a fiercly competitive industry, but still, I clearly realize that this is a way to make more money off of me for a longer amount of time. As a consumer I would much rather pay a one time fee and own the app and it’s features out-right without having to use a slice of my monthly disposable income on an ongoing subscription. But alas it appears that this is where the industry is headed and nobody really cares what a Joe Shmoe like me thinks. But I seriously love Day One- get it now! And if it doesn’t have a feature to address your super obscure need that literally no one else needs or wants, please don’t get all bent out of shape and leave them a one star review. Also, if you’re going to leave them a one star review at least have the class to punctuate your tasteless review. Nothing says intelligence like a paragraph without periods.

Developer Response ,

Thank you so much for your feedback!