Note-taking is a part of modern life. Whether it’s for work, study, or daily journaling, everyone needs to capture and manage their ideas. People often juggle between popular apps like Evernote and Google Keep, trying to find the perfect fit. However, the truth is, there are many great options out there built for users who demand more.

It is time to stop relying on big company clouds that control your most valuable asset: your personal knowledge. To get a truly better note-taking experience, the best step is to self-host your application. Moving to a self-hosted note-taking solution gives you total control, meaning you decide exactly how your data is stored. It ensures full data ownership, so your notes stay off third-party servers and completely in your hands. Additionally, you gain next-level customization, providing the flexibility to build a smarter, interconnected “second brain” that evolves with your needs.

Joplin

Secure, portable markdown for your second brain

Joplin is a fantastic, open-source alternative to Evernote that gives you back control over your notes without sacrificing features. The biggest draw is its top-tier privacy, thanks to End-to-End Encryption (E2EE). This means your notes are scrambled and secured before they even leave your device, keeping them private whether you sync them to your own server (via Docker, Nextcloud, or WebDAV) or a commercial cloud service.

As a versatile tool, Joplin offers two ways to write: a simple, familiar editor (WYSIWYG) or a clean, focused Markdown editor. Because all your notes are stored in plain-text Markdown files, they are completely future-proof and easy to move around. It fully supports notebooks, tags, and attachments, and its Web Clipper is perfect for saving articles in a snap. While its look might be a bit basic compared to rivals, its focus on robust security, portability, and an active community makes it a go-to choice for serious self-hosters.

Joplin

Joplin is a free, open-source note-taking and to-do application. It supports Markdown, end-to-end encryption, and syncs notes across all platforms with various cloud services.

Notesnook

Offline-first power for your code and markdown notes

Notesnook is a complete and modern answer for anyone looking to ditch Evernote and put their notes back in their hands. For the self-hosting crowd, the biggest win is the option to run your own completely private server. This setup means you own and manage your entire note collection, moving your knowledge from a third-party cloud to your own infrastructure. This focus on digital independence is what truly sets it apart.

More than just privacy, Notesnook makes organizing complex information simple. It offers great formatting features, including support for code snippets and Markdown, and gives you strong organizational tools like folders, tags, and the ability to pin important notes. It’s built to be offline-first, guaranteeing you can always access your data, even without the internet. When you decide to move on, the simple process for exporting notes in standard formats like Markdown and PDF ensures you are never locked in. Making Notesnook one of the best choices for a self-hosted, future-proof note-taking system.

Notesnook

Notesnook is a fully open-source, end-to-end encrypted note-taking app. It is a private alternative to Evernote, focusing on user privacy, ease of use, and multi-platform support.

Trilium Notes

Build a deep, infinite knowledge tree

When your note-taking needs get too big for simple lists, and you need a way to connect all your ideas, Trilium Notes steps up. It’s designed for people who want to build a truly huge, completely private knowledge center. Its best feature is the super deep folder system, which lets you nest notes inside notes forever. This creates a highly organized, tree-like structure that makes old-school Evernote folders look basic.

The app’s real strength is how flexible it is. Trilium lets you make a single note show up in many places using note cloning. This is a lifesaver when you can’t decide where a piece of information should live. Plus, it supports special note types like Mind Maps and Drawing Canvases (great for diagrams), so you can actually see how your ideas link up. For those who like to tinker, options like simple scripting and Note Attributes mean you can customize and automate how the app works, turning your notes system into your own personalized tool. If you have lots of big ideas, Trilium is the self-hosted solution that grows with you.

TriliumNext

TriliumNext is the community developing Trilium Notes, an open-source knowledge base and note-taking application. It helps you build your personal knowledge base for organizing and managing information.

SiYuan

Build your ideas block by block

If you are looking to replace Evernote with a self-hosted app that acts like a powerful workspace, SiYuan is a great choice. It completely changes how you manage notes by using a block-based editor, similar to modern productivity apps like Notion. This means every idea, from a single sentence to a full heading, is its own block that you can easily move, reuse, and link. This granular control over content is far superior to Evernote’s static document format.

The unique and compelling feature is the combination of block-level referencing and bi-directional linking. You can connect any small block of text to any other block in any note, creating a huge web of ideas. When you click on a block, the backlink panel instantly reveals every other note that references it, making it effortless to see related information and preventing knowledge silos. This makes it super easy to find related information and build a complete knowledge map. Because it’s a smart system that runs on your own server and is easy to use with Markdown, SiYuan is a fantastic, next-gen note-taking tool.

SiYuan

SiYuan is an open-source personal knowledge management system app focused on privacy. It can be self-hosted and offers a feature set and UI similar to Notion.

Blinko

The visual knowledge graph for total data control

Blinko is an excellent choice for a next-level note-taking experience because of its core design. Blinko utilizes a flexible, block-based structure, enabling users to create complex pages, dynamic databases, and integrated checklists, effectively functioning as a personal wiki. This modular approach provides the organizational versatility required to manage extensive research or large, multi-stage projects efficiently. It’s a complete knowledge management system, similar to Obsidian and Notion.

With advanced knowledge management features, it automatically connects related notes and visualizes those connections on a map. Instead of relying only on static folders and tags, this allows the knowledge center to grow organically, showing users the relationships between all their ideas at a glance.

Blinko

Blinko is an open-source, self-hosted personal AI note tool that prioritizes user privacy. It is designed for quickly capturing and organizing thoughts, featuring AI-enhanced note retrieval and multi-platform support.

Level up your note-taking game

Note-taking is a part of a daily routine. There are many powerful note-taking apps available that move beyond the old way of doing things. Switching to your own private note system is a huge step up. It gives you complete control, total ownership, and amazing flexibility. By running your own private setup, you get away from the limits of old apps and build a next-level knowledge map that grows exactly as you need it to.