An Apple-native
Logseq
An outliner that works directly on the Markdown files already on your disk. Daily journal, backlinks, instant search, and Git, all in a native Mac app that opens instantly.
Free forever · Apple Silicon · Intel build · Release notes
Most of what Logseq does,
and faster.
Written from scratch for Apple platforms. Not a port, not a wrapper. It uses the system text engine, the real menu bar, and native scrolling.
Your notes are just files
Plain .md files with CommonMark and wikilinks. No database, no index, no proprietary layer. Open your notes in any editor and diff them in any tool.
Search without an index
Full text, backlinks, unlinked references, and page names. A Rust ripgrep engine greps your files on every query. Nothing to rebuild, nothing to go stale.
Sync with Git, not with us
libgit2 runs inside the app. Auto-commit on save, push and pull to any remote, branch switching, conflict resolution, commit history with inline diffs, and revert down to a single file.
Outliner, keyboard first
Indent, collapse, multi-select, and drag to reorder across pages. Every edit has an exact inverse, so undo and redo never drift apart. Bracket pairs, checkboxes, and tags are built in.
⌘K and ⌘F
One palette for pages, slash commands, favorites, and recents. One find bar that reaches across every journal day, loaded or not. Both keep up with your typing.
Smooth scrolling at any size
Rows are drawn directly with CoreText on a recycled list with absolute-frame layout. A five-thousand-page journal scrolls as smoothly as an empty one.
Coming from somewhere else? SeqLog vs Logseq · SeqLog vs Obsidian
No database.
No index. No cloud.
Four decisions made early, and kept in every release since.
Everything stays in sync
Markdown is the only data store. No SQLite, no cache, no middle layer that can drift from the files. Edit a note in Vim and SeqLog shows the change right away.
No index, ever
Search greps the vault directly. No background indexing, no first-run wait, no corrupt database to delete when things go strange. Point it at a folder and write.
Apple native, all the way down
SwiftUI, AppKit, and Swift Concurrency. CoreText takes over where SwiftUI could not hold the frame rate. No cross-platform layer, and none of the performance problems that come with one.
Your sync, your server
Use the version control you already know instead of a sync service you have to trust. Auto-commit captures every edit. Push and pull move them between machines. Nothing routes through us.
The whole app is about 10 MB.
No bundled browser engine, and a dependency list short enough to print in full. Here it is.
- Interface
- SwiftUI + AppKit, CoreText-drawn rows
- Storage
- Plain Markdown files, no database
- Search
- Rust over C FFI, ripgrep engine
- Versioning
- libgit2, embedded, no
gitbinary - Language
- Swift 6.2, strict concurrency
- Tests
- 1,465 unit & UI tests
- Updates
- Sparkle, signed and notarized
- Requires
- macOS 15+, Apple Silicon or Intel
The questions everyone asks.
Is SeqLog open source?
No. It is free forever on macOS, for personal and commercial use, but the application source is not published. If open source is a requirement, Logseq and Obsidian have better answers. See the Logseq comparison.
Does it use a database?
No. Plain Markdown files are the only data store. There is no SQLite, no cache, and no search index. Search greps the files on every query through a Rust ripgrep engine, so there is nothing to rebuild and nothing to go stale.
Can Claude Code or a script edit my vault?
Yes. The vault is a folder of .md files, so anything that reads and writes files can work on your notes. SeqLog watches the folder and picks up external edits.
Can it open my existing Logseq graph?
Yes. Same layout, pages/ and journals/, and it reads Logseq's YYYY_MM_DD journal filenames alongside its own. Nothing is converted or imported, so both apps can point at the same folder.
Start writing, not waiting.
Download it, point it at a folder, and start writing. Free forever on macOS. No account, no trial, no upsell.
macOS 15+ · Apple Silicon · Intel build