A quiet desk for your novel.

NovelDesk is a writing app for novels that runs in your web browser at noveldesk.app. You can start writing right away; an account is needed only for Plus. A manuscript is a list of chapters, and beside it you keep notes on your characters and places, which you can mention in the text with @. A daily goal, writing stats and a Pomodoro timer help you write regularly, and line focus blurs everything except the line you’re on. The free desk holds two manuscripts of up to 30 chapters each, saved in your browser, with version history for the last 7 days and export to plain text or Markdown. NovelDesk Plus, $8 a month or $60 a year, saves everything to the cloud, keeps every version, exports Word, EPUB and PDF, gives 20 drawing credits a month for illustrations and publishes chapters as reading pages at read.noveldesk.app.

Yes. Writing, notes, the timer, stats, themes, backup files, importing files and exporting plain text or Markdown are free. The free desk holds two manuscripts of up to 30 chapters each, and the sample doesn’t count. At a limit you can still write, edit, export and back up; you just can’t add another manuscript or chapter. Plus lifts the limits.

Yes, for free. NovelDesk opens .docx, .txt and .md files and its own backup files, right in your browser, and splits them into chapters at the headings. Only the text comes in: bold, pictures and footnotes are left behind. Exporting to Word, EPUB and PDF is part of Plus.

On the free desk, your writing is saved only in this browser. If the browser clears this site’s data (Safari does after 7 days without a visit), the writing goes with it. With Plus, everything is saved to the cloud. Nothing is uploaded unless you subscribe to Plus or ask for a picture, which sends that one chapter or note to be drawn.

Clearing site data for noveldesk.app deletes the manuscripts kept in this browser, and Safari does it by itself after 7 days without a visit. Save a backup file now and then (bottom right of the writing screen), or use Plus, which saves everything to the cloud.

No. AI is used only for the optional Plus pictures, for chapters and for people and places: you ask for one, that chapter or note goes to our server once, and it isn’t kept.

Yes, NovelDesk works in a phone browser. To carry a manuscript between devices, open a backup file on the other one, or use Plus, which saves to the cloud.

Yes. There is a Mac app on the Mac App Store, for people who want to write in a desktop app. The web version works in any browser, with nothing to install.

Yes. In the Mac app (version 2.2 or later), export a project as “NovelDesk web (.noveldesk)”. Then open that file here: choose “Import a file” on the empty screen, Import on your desk, or “Restore from file” in the backup panel. A manuscript that is already here is replaced by the file’s version, and the text before is kept as a version. Version history, comments, goals and statistics, and bold and italic don’t come across.

Yes. Choose “Save backup” here to save a .noveldesk file. In the Mac app (version 2.2 or later), choose “Open a web backup” on the start screen or the project list, and open it. Each manuscript becomes a new project, and nothing already in the Mac app is changed. Chapter illustrations and the cloud and publishing state don’t come across.