Guide · 12 min read

The best sticky note app for Windows in 2026 — an honest, comprehensive guide.

Most reviews of "the best sticky note app" are SEO-bait listicles where every option is great. This isn't one of those. I built TSNotes, so this article is biased — but everything below is true and verifiable. If a different app fits you better, that section will say so.

Updated April 2026 · TSNotes is a $10 desktop sticky note app for Windows and Linux.

What "best" actually means.

A sticky note app does one thing: it shows a small piece of text on top of your other windows so you don't forget it. Anything beyond that is opinionated. The honest question isn't which app has the most features, it's which trade-offs match how you work.

The trade-offs that actually matter:

• Where do your notes live? On your disk where you can back them up, or in someone else's cloud that requires a login?
• What happens if the company disappears? Microsoft has killed plenty of products. Indie devs disappear too. If your notes are JSON files on your hard drive, the answer is "nothing." If they're locked in a proprietary cloud, the answer is "you lose them."
• Can you read your data without the app? A note is just words. It should be readable in Notepad, Vim, or VS Code without ceremony.
• How fast is it? If a sticky note app takes longer to launch than the thought you wanted to capture, it has failed.
• Does it stay out of your way? Notifications, subscription prompts, sync conflict popups — every interruption is the app reminding you it exists when you didn't ask.

The rest of this guide rates each app against those questions, and a few software-specific ones (themes, encryption, search, linking between notes). I'll be specific about who each app is right for.

The privacy axis everyone ignores.

Most articles comparing sticky note apps treat privacy as a footnote. It shouldn't be.

Sticky notes are where you write things you wouldn't put in an email. A throwaway password before you stash it in a manager. The number to call your therapist back. The half-formed argument you're going to have with your boss. Things you genuinely want to forget the moment you've used them.

A sticky note app that requires an account is a sticky note app where someone else gets to decide what happens to those thoughts. Microsoft has historically been reasonable about Sticky Notes data, but "reasonable" isn't the same as "encrypted at rest and inaccessible without your machine." It's not the same as "I can air-gap this app and it still works."

The cheapest privacy upgrade any software can give you is to never ask for an account. TSNotes will not ask, ever.

TSNotes — what's in it, and why.

TSNotes is a Windows desktop sticky note app. It runs locally. It stores each note as a JSON file in %APPDATA%\TSNotes\notes\. There's no server, no telemetry, no analytics, no account. You can disconnect from the internet permanently and the app behaves identically.

Here's what's actually in it.

Always-on-top by default.

Sticky notes are useless if they get buried. Every TSNotes window floats above your other windows by default. Drag them to where they make sense, resize them, and they stay put across reboots.

Boss key (Ctrl+Shift+H).

Hide every note and the search window in a single keypress. Press it again to bring everything back exactly how it was. No animations, no fade-in. Useful for screen sharing, meetings, or anyone walking up behind you.

Quick capture (Ctrl+Shift+Space).

A floating one-line input that appears in the middle of your screen, takes a sentence, hits Enter, becomes a new note. The point is to never lose a thought between thinking it and writing it down — the original use case for sticky notes everywhere, just executed properly.

Search across every note (Ctrl+Shift+F).

A small search window with a single input. Results appear as you type, ranked by recency. It searches both note bodies and titles, including notes that aren't currently visible. Encrypted notes are searchable by title only — the body stays unreadable until you decrypt it.

Daily note.

One keystroke opens (or creates) a note titled with today's date. If you've used Obsidian's daily notes, it works the same way: a stable place to dump the day's thoughts that won't multiply or get lost.

Version history.

Every meaningful edit is snapshotted to %APPDATA%\TSNotes\history\<note-id>\. Up to 50 snapshots per note, debounced so it doesn't fill your disk. Open any past version, restore it, or diff against current. You will, eventually, accidentally delete something important. This makes that fine.

Themes that change the feel of writing.

TSNotes ships with eight themes, all included in the $10 license. They're carefully tuned rather than just recoloured — different fonts, different paper textures, different typing sounds:

• Paper — warm aged-paper, handwriting font, pen-scratch typing sound.
• Tech Grey — minimal Obsidian-style dark mode for people who live in dark UIs.
• Terminal — green-on-black, monospace, like writing in a CRT.
• Amber CRT — softer warm phosphor variant of Terminal.
• Typewriter — Special Elite font on cream paper. Slower to read by design.
• E-ink — high contrast, intentionally flat. Easy on the eyes for long sessions.
• Blueprint — cyan grid on deep blue. For sketching ideas more than recording them.
• Dossier — manila folder with red stamp accents. For the dramatic.

Themes aren't just colour swaps — they change the font, the line height, the texture. A typewriter note feels like a different document than a terminal note, even if the words are identical. This sounds excessive but writing tools that respect their context get used; writing tools that all look the same get forgotten.

Per-note AES-256-GCM encryption.

Click the lock icon on any note, set a passphrase, and the body is encrypted with AES-256 in Galois/Counter Mode. The key is derived from your passphrase using scrypt — slow on purpose, so brute-forcing a stolen JSON file is expensive even with a fast GPU.

Encryption is opt-in per note, not all-or-nothing. Sensitive thoughts get a passphrase; the grocery list doesn't need one. Encrypting a note also clears its prior version history (the unencrypted snapshots) so the disk doesn't keep an unencrypted shadow copy of what you just locked.

Trust note: the encryption is local. The app does not derive your passphrase server-side, transmit it, or back it up. If you forget the passphrase, the note is gone — that's the trade-off you accept for a tool that can't betray you.

Tags, wikilinks, and the small graph of a desk.

Most sticky note apps treat each note as an island. TSNotes lets notes reference each other in two lightweight ways borrowed from Obsidian and Roam Research:

• Hashtags. Type #groceries in any note and it joins a group. The tag panel lists every tag in your collection with a count and a click-through to all notes that use it.
• Wikilinks. Type [[Project Hummingbird]] and the app turns it into a clickable link to a note titled "Project Hummingbird." If that note doesn't exist yet, clicking creates it. Every note also gets an automatic backlinks panel: "what other notes link to this one?"

You don't have to use either. They're invisible until you type the syntax. But the moment you do, your notes stop being a pile and become a graph — a small one, scoped to your desk, but still much faster than scrolling through 200 yellow rectangles to find that one thing.

The honest alternatives.

No app is for everyone. Here are the ones I'd point people at if TSNotes isn't right for them.

Microsoft Sticky Notes.

Comes with Windows. Six fixed colours, no themes, no encryption. Syncs to your Microsoft account if you're signed in, which is either a feature or a deal-breaker depending on your stance. It works, it's free, and zero installation. Use it if you want the simplest possible thing and you trust Microsoft with your notes.

Stickies (Zhornsoftware).

A piece of Windows freeware that has been around since approximately the Mesozoic. Runs everywhere, no account, genuinely impressive longevity. The UI hasn't been meaningfully updated in over a decade and it shows. Use it if you want freeware with deep configurability and you don't care about visuals.

Notezilla.

A polished commercial sticky note app focused on cloud sync between desktops and phones. The free tier is limited; the full version is a subscription. Good if you genuinely need notes mirrored to your phone in real time. Use it if cross-device sync is the actual feature you're paying for.

Simple Sticky Notes.

A long-running freeware app from Simnet. Free tier is ad-supported, paid tier removes ads. Use it if you want something free, simple, and don't mind the ads.

Apple Stickies.

Built into macOS. If you're on a Mac, it's there. Windows users — irrelevant.

Side-by-side comparison.

This table summarises the trade-offs above. "Yes" / "No" without context is misleading; read the alternatives section for nuance.

	TSNotes	MS Sticky Notes	Stickies (Zhorn)	Notezilla
Requires account	No	For sync only	No	For sync
Cloud sync	No (by design)	MS account	No	Yes
Local-only data	Plain JSON files	Sandboxed DB	Local DB	Local + cloud copy
Encryption per note	AES-256-GCM	No	Password-protect (older crypto)	No
Themes	8 included	6 colours	Custom skins	Skins
Hashtags + wikilinks	Yes	No	No	No
Search across notes	Ctrl+Shift+F	In-app only	Yes	Yes
Boss key	Ctrl+Shift+H	No	Yes	Yes
Telemetry / analytics	None	Microsoft default	None	Crashes / usage
Lifetime updates	Yes — included	With Windows	Manual	Subscription required
Pricing model	$10 once · lifetime	Free w/ Windows	Free / donation	Subscription

Who TSNotes is for.

• People who treat sticky notes as a thinking tool, not a sync surface. If you want the same notes on your phone, this isn't your app — buy Notezilla. If you want a quiet thinking surface on one machine, you're in the right place.
• People who keep sensitive thoughts in throwaway places. Per-note encryption means you can dump a half-thought passphrase or a phone number you don't want a co-worker to glance at, and lock it before you walk away.
• People who use Obsidian, Logseq, or similar markdown-graph tools and miss having that linking model in a lighter-weight UI for the day-to-day stuff. Wikilinks + tags + daily notes give you a tiny version of that graph without the weight.
• People who don't want a subscription for a sticky note app. $10 once, ever — every theme, every feature, every future update included. No "Pro" tier, no add-ons, no upsells.

Who it isn't for.

• Anyone who needs notes mirrored to their phone. There is no TSNotes mobile app and there isn't one planned. Microsoft Sticky Notes (with Outlook integration) and Notezilla both do this; use one of them.
• Anyone who needs a signed-and-notarized macOS app. TSNotes ships an unsigned macOS .zip — works fine but Gatekeeper asks you to right-click → Open the first time. If a "trust prompt" on first launch is a deal-breaker, Apple Stickies is built into macOS and skips that. (Linux users — there's an AppImage; works best on KDE/XFCE, GNOME users will need an extension to see the system tray.)
• Anyone whose primary requirement is "shared notes with a teammate." TSNotes is intentionally single-user. For multiplayer, you want something else entirely (Notion, a shared OneDrive folder, or Notezilla's network feature).

A note on price.

TSNotes is $10. Once. Ever. That gets you every feature, every theme, every future update — for life. No subscription, no "Pro" tier, no AI add-on, no account, no ads, no telemetry. The license is signed offline and works on every computer you own.

The reason it's $10 and not free: an indie developer can't sustain an app long-term without revenue, and "the smallest dollar amount that respects both of us" is roughly $10. Cheaper than a month of most productivity tools, and you only ever pay it once. If you use the app and want it to keep getting better, that's how.

Lifetime updates and free email support are included — reply to your purchase email anytime and a real human (the developer) replies back. No ticket queue, no support tier upsell. 30-day refund if it isn't for you, no questions asked.

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FAQ.

What is the best sticky note app for Windows?

For most Windows users in 2026, the best sticky note app is the one whose trade-offs match how you actually work. If you want zero cloud sync, no account, and notes that live as plain JSON on your own disk, TSNotes is purpose-built for that. If you want something built into Windows with Microsoft account sync, Microsoft Sticky Notes is fine. If you want decades-old freeware with no modern UI, Stickies by Zhornsoftware still works. There's no single winner — the question is which trade-offs you'd rather make.

Is there a sticky note app for Windows that doesn't require an account or subscription?

Yes — TSNotes. It's a one-time $10 purchase with no account, no email signup, no cloud, no subscription. It runs locally on your machine and stores notes as plain JSON files on your disk. Lifetime updates and free email support are included. The license is signed offline so activation works without internet.

Can sticky notes be encrypted?

In TSNotes, individual notes can be encrypted with a passphrase. The encryption is AES-256-GCM with a key derived from your passphrase using scrypt — strong, modern crypto. Encrypted note bodies are unreadable on disk, even if someone copies the JSON file. Most other sticky note apps either don't offer encryption at all or use older password-protection schemes that protect against casual snooping but not a determined attacker.

How is TSNotes different from Microsoft Sticky Notes?

Microsoft Sticky Notes is built into Windows, syncs to your Microsoft account, has six fixed colours, and stores its data inside the Windows app sandbox. TSNotes is a separate $10 purchase, has no cloud sync, comes with eight themes, supports per-note encryption, hashtags and wikilinks between notes, version history, and stores data as plain JSON files you can open with any text editor.

Do sticky note apps work without internet?

TSNotes works completely offline — there is no server it talks to, license activation is offline (signatures are verified locally), the update notifier fails silently if you're not online. Microsoft Sticky Notes works offline too, but its sync feature obviously requires internet. Apps marketed around team sharing or multi-device sync (Notezilla, etc.) need a connection to do anything beyond local editing.

Does TSNotes work on Linux?

Yes — there's a 64-bit AppImage that runs on any glibc-based Linux distro: Ubuntu, Mint, Debian, Fedora, Arch, Pop!_OS, Manjaro, openSUSE, Zorin, Elementary, and similar. Download the AppImage, chmod +x it, and double-click to run. No installer, no root required.

The one caveat is GNOME, which removed system tray icons by default a few major versions ago. TSNotes runs on GNOME, but the tray icon — which is how most features are reached — won't appear unless you install the AppIndicator and KStatusNotifierItem Support extension. KDE Plasma, XFCE, Cinnamon, MATE, and most other desktop environments show the tray natively, no setup needed. Alpine (musl libc), 32-bit, and ARM Linux are not supported.

Where does TSNotes store my notes?

%APPDATA%\TSNotes\notes\ — one JSON file per note. Version history goes in a parallel history\ folder. App settings, including your license key, are in settings.json in the same parent. You can back the whole folder up to a USB drive, sync it via Syncthing or Dropbox, or zip it for archiving — it's just files.

Can I import my notes from Microsoft Sticky Notes?

TSNotes has a generic JSON import (Tray menu → Import). You'd need to convert your existing notes to the JSON format first. Microsoft Sticky Notes stores its data in %LocalAppData%\Packages\Microsoft.MicrosoftStickyNotes_*\LocalState\plum.sqlite; a small script can pull each note out and emit the right JSON. We don't ship a Microsoft-specific importer because the format has changed across Windows versions and tends to break.

Is TSNotes open source?

No. The app is a one-developer project funded by license sales. Source isn't currently published.

What happens if you stop developing the app?

Your notes keep working — they're plain JSON files. The license is signed offline so it keeps working forever, no server check involved. The app itself runs without any phone-home, so even if every domain we own went dark tomorrow, nothing about your local copy would change.

How do I get the app?

Buy on the homepage ($10, Stripe checkout, 30 seconds). You'll get an email with your license key plus download links for Windows (portable .zip) and Linux (AppImage). Extract / chmod and run — no installer, no setup wizard. Windows SmartScreen may warn that the app is unsigned; click "More info" → "Run anyway" if so.