Changelog
Every release of the Mac app, newest first.
3.24
Dutch and Greek, which takes the app to nineteen languages besides English
The last export message that was still English is translated too.
Improved
- Every source card now shows how far it is from its first export, one step at a time, and the steps go away once you have synced that source. A card that is folded up says where it is too, "step 1 of 3" beside "not connected", rather than leaving you to guess how far away connected is.
- Any file in the Documents list can be converted on its own. Hover a row and a button at its right converts just that document, so a folder of papers can be dipped into rather than synced whole. It counts against the same free allowance a sync does, and at the free limit the row shows a lock instead of starting a run.
Fixed
- A note that Apple Notes was in the middle of rewriting no longer counts as a failure. While iCloud settles, Apple Notes can rewrite a note underneath the export, so the same note could fail one minute and export perfectly ten minutes later. Such a note is read a second time before anything is reported, and the message says what happened rather than naming the part of the file that could not be read.
- What's new, in the About page, is in your own language now. It used to be an English list under an app translated everywhere else.
3.23
Documents, a new source
Point it at a folder and it turns Word, PowerPoint, Excel, OpenDocument, RTF, EPUB, CSV and PDF files into markdown.
New
- The command line learned the new source: exporter sync --source documents.
Improved
- Conversion happens entirely on your Mac. Nothing is uploaded, including scanned pages, which are read with Apple's own text recognition.
- Documents can write more than one format at once. Its format row is checkboxes now, so a document can land as markdown for your vault and as HTML out of one sync, side by side in the same folder.
- Every screen is translated. The About page, the Apps page and a few source cards were still English in other languages.
- An About page, reachable from the app menu, the heart in the footer and its own tab. It carries the story of the app, who made it, and the newsletter.
Fixed
- Contacts groups were showing every card in an account rather than the groups you made, which made the tab useless. Groups and Companies are trees now, like folders, and each one exports into its own folder: groups/Family/ada.md. People in no group and cards with no company get a folder of their own rather than disappearing.
- Smart folders from Apple Notes are a tab of their own, beside Folders and Tags. A smart folder is a saved search, so its notes are worked out fresh on every sync rather than read from a list. One whose rule this version cannot read says so instead of exporting the wrong notes.
- Connecting Apple Notes is simpler: the panel opens on the folder the app needs and the wrong one can no longer be picked. Closing the panel now tells you how to get back to it.
- The folder you pick for exports is the folder your files land in. Choosing a folder you made yourself used to put everything in a subfolder inside it, whatever you picked.
3.22
Screen Time has a list of days for the first time, so the ten free days are ten days you chose rather than ten the app picked
Sort by Busiest to find the ones worth keeping.
New
- Czech, Ukrainian, Polish, Romanian, Vietnamese and Hungarian.
Improved
- Every source has tabs now, not just Apple Notes. Bear adds Recent, Pinned, Archived and Files beside its tags. Messages splits People from Groups and can show only what you have not read. Contacts gains Groups and Companies.
Fixed
- Nothing exports until you ask it to. Connecting a source and choosing a folder no longer starts a sync on its own, and real-time sync begins after your first manual sync of that source.
- Contacts groups were never being read at all, and Messages counted almost every conversation as unread. Both fixed.
3.21
German, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese, Turkish, Arabic and Traditional Chinese
The app follows your Mac's language, and you can pick another from the footer or in Settings.
New
- Four new ways to find a note: Shared, Pinned, Recent and Popular sit beside Folders and Tags. Popular ranks by how often you actually open a note.
Improved
- Setting up is guided: the welcome card walks you through connecting, choosing where the files go, and the first sync, one step at a time.
3.20
Japanese, French, Simplified Chinese and Korean
Improved
- A welcome screen on first launch explains what the app does, what is free, and what the one-time unlock costs.
Fixed
- Small fixes across the source cards.
3.19
Screen Time, a new source
Every day becomes a markdown file with app usage, websites, notifications and screen sessions.
Fixed
- Fixed a crash and a flickering scroll bar when macOS is set to always show scroll bars. The bar no longer takes width from the layout.
- The rating row no longer sits lower than the other rows.
3.18
Fixed a crash when opening a folder in the notes list
If the app quit on you while you were browsing folders, that is gone.
Improved
- Prices now appear in your own currency. Exporter is also considerably cheaper in many countries: Apple's automatic conversion had been charging some regions more than customers in the United States pay, and that is now corrected.
Fixed
- The notes list no longer stalls while Apple Notes is syncing in the background.
3.17
Pick your conversations
The Messages card lists every conversation with a checkbox, so you can untick the ones you do not want exported.
Improved
- Messages sync is much faster: photos convert on every core, and the next conversation loads while the current one is written. The free counter ticks live during a sync.
- Settings has notes database diagnostics that show whether the app can read your Notes library, and problem reports include that summary on their own, so one report is enough.
Fixed
- Fixed Apple Notes showing 0 notes on some Macs even though Notes was full, a quirk of long-lived Notes libraries.
3.16
Messages, a new source
Every conversation becomes one markdown file: a heading per day, who said what and when, reactions on the message they belong to, edited messages with their earlier versions as footnotes, replies as real links, and the photos and videos people sent copied next to the text.
Improved
- Connect Contacts too and the two link up: a chat links to the person's card, and their card lists your conversations with them.
- Your 10 most recent conversations are free, and a one-time purchase unlocks the rest.
- Exporter keeps a local index of everything you connect. That is what lets a sync touch only the conversations that changed, and it lets the built-in MCP server find a person by name across your notes, contacts and chats.
3.15
Contacts, a new source
Every card becomes a markdown file, with name, phones, emails, addresses, birthdays, social profiles, relationships and groups as properties and the card's note as the body, and it stays in sync as you edit in Contacts.
New
- The command line learned the new source: exporter sync --source contacts.
Improved
- 100 contacts are free, and a one-time purchase unlocks the rest.
- Connected sources sort to the top, and the export log shows every source.
3.14
Exporting by tag keeps your selection
A full resync could quietly change which tags were selected; the tags you pick are now remembered across syncs.
Improved
- Anonymous usage statistics, which you can turn off in Settings. They count which features are used and roughly how big libraries are, never your note content, titles or paths.
3.13
Readable in dark mode
Links, status text and every accent color adapt to light and dark instead of staying a light-mode blue on a dark background, and contrast is checked on every build so it cannot drift back.
Improved
- Cleaner typography. The monospaced face is used only for counts, dates, file paths and commands; everything else reads in the system font.
- One obvious action per source. Sync now is a proper primary button instead of one of six identical buttons, with the quieter actions grouped beneath it.
- The free tier says what it means. You can see how many of your 100 free notes are used, and it says plainly that your first 100 notes keep re-syncing free forever; only new notes past 100 need the one-time unlock.
- Release notes on the main screen: subscribe to occasional release notes and tips, double opt-in, unsubscribe any time.
- Tidier note rows. Each note has one link that opens it in Apple Notes; reveal in Finder and open the exported file moved to the right-click menu.
Fixed
- A bigger, clearer window. Text is larger throughout, the window is wider and can be resized, and long folder names and export paths no longer cut off mid-word.
- Thin scroll bars. Scroll handles no longer sit on a grey track, including when macOS is set to always show scroll bars.
- Exporter no longer writes file paths to the system console, and no longer leaves a debug file in your Documents folder when it exports a note with a table.
3.12
Your export folder mirrors your notes
Files whose note was deleted, renamed or moved away are removed, tracked by a manifest so nothing the app did not write is ever touched.
Improved
- Exports started from cron, Carbon Copy Cloner or any root-owned automation stay attached and return the real exit code. macOS was suspending the export when no desktop session was present, and the caller read that as the command finishing while the export was still writing.
Fixed
- Attachment filenames no longer change between exports. When two attachments in one folder share a name, the suffix is decided up front and stays the same every run, so backup tools stop recopying identical files.
- One run log per export, written in the folder that run wrote to. The duplicate copy that used to land in your sync folder is gone, and the export log still reads every folder the app knows about.
3.11
Handwritten notes and drawings export properly
Drawings, sketches and handwriting are exported as images or PDFs next to your markdown files and embedded in the note.
Improved
- Apple's recognized handwriting text is included below the image, so exported notes are searchable and readable by AI tools.
- Drawings that cannot be found on disk are reported in the export log instead of being skipped silently.
Fixed
- Scanned documents that used to export without a file are included.
3.10
Better visibility into your purchases
Fixed
- Fixes for the command line.
3.9
The command line is more robust
Improved
- The Obsidian plugin reached version 0.3.0.
3.8
The command line is fixed
7, copy the install command from the Command Line card once more.
Improved
- Running exporter with no arguments shows usage help instead of failing.
Fixed
- exporter report prints a diagnostic summary of the app state, recent exports and the last crash, and copies it to the clipboard. Add --send to send it straight to us.
- Fixed the app quitting on its own after launching in menu bar mode or after clicking the menu bar icon.
3.7
The exporter command line tool, as a preview
Improved
- Better HTML export, with resizable images.
3.6
Logseq, a new source
Export your Logseq graphs to markdown with the same real-time sync as Apple Notes and Bear, free.
Improved
- Background sync. Turn on launch at login and menu bar mode, and your notes keep exporting with the window closed. The menu bar shows live sync status for every source.
- An MCP server card: start and stop it, connect Claude, Cursor or VS Code with one click, and it starts with the app.
- Exports run in parallel, so big libraries export without freezing the app.
Fixed
- Fixed created and modified dates, which now appear as real date properties in Obsidian. Thanks to Natalie for the report.
- Fixed notes with identical titles overwriting each other. Attachments with matching names are kept separate, and real-time sync no longer stops silently after macOS database maintenance.
3.5
An export log
After each export you can see how many notes succeeded or failed, any attachment issues, and a history of past runs, inside the app and saved next to your export.
Improved
- Bear exports are logged too, alongside Apple Notes.
- HTML export copies attachments, images and files, next to the pages and links them in. They were missing before.
Fixed
- Fixed internal note links. They keep their titles and link to the right note in both markdown and HTML exports, where they used to show a raw ID.
3.4
Improved the support widgets
3.3
Better MCP server tools
Improved
- The MCP server shows its logs.
3.2
Connect your notes to AI tools
Exporter includes a local MCP server that lets Cursor, VS Code, Claude Desktop and Claude Code read your exported notes as context.
Fixed
- Fixed the Bear card expanding on every launch.
3.1
Support for the companion Obsidian plugin
3.0
Bear, a new source, free and unlimited
Improved
- Real-time sync: notes export on their own when they change.
- Export straight into an Obsidian vault, with default Obsidian bases created for you.
- All attachments are included with exports.
- Full resync re-exports everything from scratch.
- A completely redesigned interface.
2.0
Browse individual notes inside folders and tags
Improved
- Folder and note icons in the tree view.
- Open exported notes in your default editor, or reveal them in Finder.
- Deep links to any note in Apple Notes.
- Double-click a row to select or deselect it.
- Markdown is the default export format.
- Export controls fit on one compact row, and a taller tree view shows more folders at once.
Fixed
- Fixed notes not loading when you expand a folder.
1.13
Export up to 100 notes for free
Improved
- Selecting a folder includes all its subfolders.
- Export results fit on a single line.
1.12
Small updates that prepare for more customization
1.11
Export by tag, as well as by folder
Improved
- A feedback widget.
1.10
Updated help
1.9
A better help section
1.8
Markdown export, alongside HTML
1.7
A better design
1.6
A new logo
1.5
Recently deleted notes can be exported too
1.4
Fixed a bug with special folder names
1.3
Bug fixes
1.2
A better interface
Improved
- A link to alto.index, a sibling export app with more options.
1.1
The app's name has a space in it now
1.0
The first release
It exports your Apple Notes as HTML files on your Mac.