8 Best Apple Notes Exporters for Mac in 2026

Apple Notes Exporter Pro

Apple Notes Exporter Pro is built for the job most people actually have: get every note out of Apple Notes, keep it readable, and do it in whatever format the next step needs. It exports to fifteen formats, including PDF, Word (DOCX), Markdown, HTML, RTF, EPUB, LaTeX, JSON, plain text, and JSONL for AI training data. That range is the reason it sits at the top of this list. Most of the other tools here do one or two formats.

It is a batch tool by default. You pick the folders you want, choose a format, and it exports the whole selection in one pass while keeping your folder structure and the attachments inside each note. Images, scans, voice notes, and files stay with the note they belong to, and drawings are written out as images, so a PDF export looks like the note did in the app, and a Markdown export keeps its images in a matching folder.

The feature that sets it apart for backups is scheduled export. You can point it at your notes and have it drop a fresh copy into a folder on a schedule, which turns a one-time chore into a set-and-forget backup. Pair that folder with an external drive or a second cloud and you have real protection against an accidental delete syncing across your devices.

It is $9.99 as a one-time purchase with lifetime updates and no subscription. It runs on macOS 11 Big Sur and later, natively on both Intel and Apple Silicon. It is not free, and it does not keep a live Markdown copy in sync the way Notes Exporter does. But if you want one tool that produces a proper archive in any common format, this is the most complete option in 2026.

View Apple Notes Exporter Pro

kzaremski/apple-notes-exporter

Apple Notes Exporter, built by developer Konstantin Zaremski and distributed free on GitHub under the GPLv3 license, is the most capable exporter in this roundup by raw format count. It bulk-exports iCloud notes to eighteen formats across four groups: document formats (HTML, PDF, TeX, Markdown, RTF, plain text, DOCX, ODT, EPUB), structured data (JSON, JSONL, XML, CSV), outline formats (OPML, Org-mode, reStructuredText, AsciiDoc), and ENEX for moving into Evernote. It writes output as a folder, a ZIP, a TAR, or a single file (the single-file option works for fourteen of the eighteen text-based formats; binary formats like DOCX and PDF need the folder, ZIP, or TAR mode).

Beyond the GUI app, it ships a command-line tool, Apple Shortcuts actions and App Intents, and its own MCP server, notes-export-mcp, with six tools for AI assistants: list_accounts, list_folders, list_notes, get_note, export_notes, and sync_status. Worth knowing if you connect it to Claude or another assistant: export_notes is sandboxed to only write files under your home folder or /tmp, a real security control that neither Apple Notes Exporter Pro nor Notes Exporter, the two products in this roundup with any AI angle at all, document as explicitly for their own export paths. As of this check (Oct 18, 2026, verified directly on GitHub), the project has grown to roughly 740 stars and 47 forks and is on version 2.1, which added CLI folder selection, a Recently Deleted export option, sync history, and the expanded MCP server above.

The honest tradeoffs are setup and polish. It is not on the Mac App Store, so you download it from GitHub Releases and have to allow apps from identified developers in Privacy & Security before it will open, a step that will stop a non-technical user cold. There is no built-in recurring-schedule toggle the way Apple Notes Exporter Pro has one; its incremental sync (a manifest-based mode that skips unchanged notes and prunes deleted ones, available as a CLI flag or a GUI toggle) and its Shortcuts actions can approximate a backup routine, but you have to wire that automation together yourself. It also needs macOS 11 Big Sur or later, 4GB of RAM, and Full Disk Access, same as any tool that reads the Notes database directly.

One more thing worth knowing before you install it: this project and Apple Notes Exporter Pro have real history. In February 2026, Zaremski published a forensic analysis alleging our app used code adapted from his project without the MIT attribution notice the license requires. The notice was genuinely missing, we added it in version 1.7 build 3, and Zaremski publicly confirmed in March 2026 that he had verified the fix himself, directly in the binary. We cover the whole timeline, with direct quotes and links to every source, in our full writeup on the licensing dispute. We think it is only fair to point you there before you decide which of these two tools to trust with your notes.

View kzaremski/apple-notes-exporter on GitHub →

storizzi/notes-exporter

storizzi/notes-exporter is a free, MIT-licensed command-line tool, now at version 1.3.0, that exports Apple Notes to raw HTML, processed HTML with extracted images, plain text, Markdown written for Obsidian-style vaults, PDF, and Word (DOCX). Exports are incremental, so a second run only touches notes that changed, and by default everything lands in ~/Downloads/AppleNotesExport/. As of this check (Oct 18, 2026, verified directly on GitHub), it has 271 stars and 36 forks, smaller than kzaremski's project but real and actively maintained, with 12 open issues and 6 open pull requests at the time of writing.

Its real differentiator is not the format list, which is the shortest of any tool in this roundup. It is bidirectional sync: you can edit an exported Markdown file and sync that change back into the original Apple Note, with conflict sidecars and a reconciliation step if both sides changed. It also supports scheduled exports through launchd, text and regex search across your exported notes, and an optional AI semantic search layer built on Qdrant and Ollama, for finding notes by meaning instead of keyword. None of the other seven tools here offer a write-back path into Apple Notes at all.

The cost of that power is setup. There is no GUI. Installing means cloning the repository, running brew install git python, then pip install -r requirements.txt, and the extra features bring their own dependencies: PDF export needs Google Chrome, Word export needs Pandoc, and the AI search needs Docker and Ollama running locally. The project does not state a minimum macOS version beyond needing AppleScript and the Notes app, which in practice means a reasonably current macOS. This is a tool for someone who already scripts their Mac, not a first exporter for a non-technical user.

View storizzi/notes-exporter on GitHub →

Exporter

Exporter, by Chintan Ghate, is the free tool most people should try first if Markdown or HTML is all they need. It is a simple Mac App Store app that reads your Apple Notes and writes them out as Markdown or HTML files, keeping your folder structure and the attachments in each note. For a plain, portable backup, it does the job and costs nothing.

It has been maintained for years and the current version is 4.0.8. The core export is free with no time limit and no note cap. There is one optional in-app purchase, a Notebook Filter for $4.99, that lets you export selected folders instead of everything at once. For most people the free version is all they will ever use.

The honest limit is format. Exporter does Markdown and HTML, and that is it. If you need a PDF for records or a Word file to send to someone, it cannot make those, and you would reach for Apple Notes Exporter Pro or the native PDF export instead. It also runs a one-time export rather than a live sync. But as a free, no-fuss way to pull your notes into Markdown, it is the best in this roundup, and it runs a little further back than most, on macOS 10.15 Catalina and later.

Notes Exporter (NotesExporter.app)

Notes Exporter, from System Operator LLC, takes a different angle from the tools above. Instead of a one-time export, it can keep a Markdown copy of your notes synced in the background as you keep writing in Apple Notes. Edit a note, and the matching Markdown file updates. That makes it a good fit if you want an always-current Markdown mirror rather than a fixed archive.

Its standout feature is a built-in MCP server. MCP, the Model Context Protocol, is the standard AI tools use to read outside data, so Notes Exporter can hand your exported notes to Claude, Cursor, or VS Code as context for questions and coding. It also ships an Obsidian plugin and can export from Bear and Logseq, not just Apple Notes. If you work with AI assistants and want your notes available to them, nothing else in this roundup does that out of the box.

It is free for up to 100 Apple Notes, and a one-time $4.99 in-app purchase unlocks unlimited export, with no subscription. The tradeoffs are format and system support. Like Exporter, it outputs Markdown and HTML only, so no PDF or Word, and it requires macOS 15 Sequoia or later, which rules out older Macs. If your Mac is a few versions behind, or you need a fixed PDF archive, look to Apple Notes Exporter Pro instead.

Obsidian Importer

The Obsidian Importer is technically an importer rather than an exporter, but if your destination is Obsidian or any Markdown app, it is one of the best free ways to pull everything out of Apple Notes. It is an official plugin from the Obsidian team. You install it from Community Plugins, pick Apple Notes, and it reads your library and writes clean Markdown files straight into a vault.

What makes it impressive is how much it keeps. Because Apple Notes has no real export, the Importer reads the local Notes database directly, and it handles tables, images, drawings, scans, PDFs, and links, not just plain text. It is free, it processes your whole library in one run, and it lets you fold Apple Notes into a vault alongside imports from Evernote, OneNote, and others.

The limits are worth knowing. It only imports on macOS, it produces Markdown and nothing else, and it is a one-time move, not an ongoing sync. If you want a live link that keeps updating, Notes Exporter fits better, and if you need PDF or Word, this is not the tool. But for a free, high-fidelity, one-shot move from Apple Notes to Markdown, especially into Obsidian, it is excellent.

Built-in macOS Export

You do not always need an app. Apple Notes has a small built-in export that is perfect for the odd note. Select a note, choose File then Export as PDF, and you get a fixed, readable copy that looks the same anywhere. Recent versions of macOS also added File then Export as Markdown, which is handy if you are sending a note to a Markdown app.

For one note, or a few, this is the fastest route. There is nothing to install, nothing to pay, and a PDF export keeps the images and layout because they are baked into the page. If you just need to email a single note as a document, or save one important note for your records, start here.

It falls apart at scale. There is no clean way to export your whole library at once, so exporting hundreds of notes means selecting and saving them one by one. It flattens your folder structure, and your only choices are PDF and Markdown. The moment you are thinking about a full backup or a migration, a dedicated exporter saves hours. But as a free tool that is always there for small jobs, the native export earns its spot.

One more thing worth knowing before you attempt a large native Markdown export: a documented bug in Apple's bulk Markdown export has caused duplicated lines and blank files on libraries of 100+ notes, and it is still unresolved as of macOS Tahoe 26.2. It has not shown up in the one-note-at-a-time workflow above, but if you are exporting a large library natively, verify the output before you trust it as a backup.

Shortcuts and AppleScript

If you are comfortable tinkering, macOS gives you the parts to build your own exporter for free. The Shortcuts app can loop through your notes, turn each one into a PDF, and save the files to a folder, and you can attach that shortcut to an automation so it runs on a schedule. AppleScript can do similar work and hand off to tools like Pandoc if you want other formats.

The appeal is control and cost. It is free, it runs entirely on your Mac, and once it works you can schedule it to keep a fresh backup without any third-party app. People who like automation often already have a Shortcuts habit, and a notes backup is a natural thing to add to it.

The catch is setup and fragility. Building a reliable shortcut takes time, formatting and attachments can come out rough, and Apple sometimes changes how Notes behaves between macOS versions, which can quietly break a script. For a lot of people a $9.99 app that just works is the better trade. But if you enjoy building your own tools, this is the most flexible free option, and it is the only free route that gives you scheduled backups out of the box.