# Get started

Connect an app, pick a folder, press sync now.

Exporter reads apps on your Mac and writes what it finds as files in a folder you choose, then keeps those files current as you keep using the apps. Every app is set up the same way: connect it, choose its export folder, press "sync now".

## Install

Get Exporter from the Mac App Store ([download](https://exporter.dev/download)), where it is listed as "Exporter: Notes to Markdown". It runs on macOS 15 or later on Apple silicon. There is no account and nothing to sign in to.

## Connect an app

Home has one card per app; Bear and Logseq get a card only when they are installed.

1. Press "connect" on the card. On first launch the welcome card's "connect apple notes" does the same for Apple Notes.
2. A folder panel opens already inside that app's data folder. Choose nothing inside it and press "Select this folder". Logseq and Documents ask for a folder of your own instead: the graph, or the folder your documents are in.

That is the whole permission: no Full Disk Access and no macOS prompt. Exporter reads that one folder, read-only, and remembers it. Connecting Apple Notes from the welcome card opens the Apple Notes card for the next step.

## Choose the export folder

Press "select export folder" and pick where this app's files go. How deep the folder is decides where they land:

| you choose | files land in |
| --- | --- |
| your home folder, or a folder right in it, like `~/Documents` or `~/Dropbox` | a new subfolder inside it, like `~/Documents/notes-export` |
| a deeper folder, like `~/Documents/notes` | that folder, as it is |

The card's `export to` row shows the real folder, and "change..." picks another. Give each app its own folder and keep them side by side, like `~/Documents/notes` and `~/Documents/messages`: the [MCP server](https://exporter.dev/docs/mcp) only serves export folders that sit next to the Apple Notes one.

## Run the first export

Press "sync now". You can close the window while it writes. When it finishes, `last sync` shows the time and how many items were exported, and real-time sync is on for that app: from then on a change in the app is written to its file on its own.

Each export folder also gets `.exporter/`, the record of each run that the Export log (the clock icon) shows. What else lands in the folder, and every field inside the files, differs per app: each app has its own page in the docs, like [Apple Notes](https://exporter.dev/docs/notes).

## What keeps running

- closing the window stops nothing: the app keeps syncing, with its Dock icon, until you quit it. Quitting stops real-time sync and the MCP server
- Settings > "launch at login" starts Exporter after a restart, so syncing picks up on its own
- Settings > "menu bar mode" adds a menu bar icon with each app's status, and the window no longer opens at launch
- real-time sync has no switch. It starts with an app's first "sync now" and stops when you press "disconnect", which forgets the app's folder and leaves the exported files where they are
- with the app quit, `exporter sync` from [the command line](https://exporter.dev/docs/cli) catches up

## Unlocking

Each app exports free up to its allowance (Bear and Logseq have no limit), and whatever it exported keeps syncing free. The unlock button on an app's card is a one-time purchase for that app, no subscription, and "restore purchase" brings it back on another Mac ([pricing](https://exporter.dev/pricing)).

## What full resync removes

"full resync" on a card asks first, then removes only the files Exporter wrote in the export folder. Then it exports again and picks the free items again. Anything else in the folder stays: your own notes, an Obsidian vault's `.obsidian`, a folder of documents. Still, give every export a folder of its own, so its files and yours stay apart.

A normal sync removes only files Exporter wrote itself that no item produces any more.

## Backups

The export folder is a mirror: an item you delete in its app is removed from it on the next sync, so it is not an archive. For dated copies that never change, [Back up Apple Notes](https://exporter.dev/guides/notes/back-up-apple-notes) sets up nightly snapshots with the command line. Restoring means copying files back: Exporter never writes into your apps.

## Related

- [Apple Notes](https://exporter.dev/docs/notes): Folders, fields, HTML and fixes
- [Guides](https://exporter.dev/guides): One job each, step by step
- [Help](https://exporter.dev/docs/help): Problems and questions, with fixes

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human version: https://exporter.dev/docs/getting-started
every page: https://exporter.dev/llms.txt