01 What TackNote is
A TackNote note is a sticky note that can hold more than words. One note can carry typed text, a checklist, a sketch, photos and videos, any number of voice recordings with their transcripts, a reminder and a place. You can record an hour-long meeting onto a note, watch the words land as people talk, and have a summary written on your iPhone afterwards.
If you use TackNote on a Mac, your iPhone notes can sync to it through your own iCloud, and arrive on your Mac's TackBoard ready to tack to the window, document or web page they belong to.
02 Getting TackNote
- On your iPhone, go to tacknote.app/mobile and tap the download button. It takes you to the right place to install TackNote for iPhone.
- Open TackNote. There is no account to make and nothing to sign in to. You land straight on your board, and your 7-day free trial starts.
TackNote needs iOS 26 or later. It also runs on iPad, where the board spreads across more columns.
03 The board
Your notes live on a corkboard as tilted paper cards, with the one you changed most recently first. The wooden rail along the bottom holds everything else:
- Notes: your board.
- Places: notes tacked to places, and a map of where notes were written.
- Record: start a recording in one tap.
- Folders: your projects and sub-folders.
- New: a fresh note.
Each card shows its title, a preview of what is inside, the first photo, and small badges for recordings, photos and a place. When you are standing at a note's place, its tack turns green.
Search
Type in Search notes at the top of the board. Search looks through every folder at once: labels, text, checklist items, recording transcripts and place names.
Filtering by folder
Once you have projects, chips appear above the board: All notes, one chip per project, and Unfiled. Tap a project to see only its notes, and a second row of chips for its sub-folders.
To file a note without opening it, press and hold its card and drag it onto a chip. Drop it on All notes to take it out of every project.
Settings
Tap the TackNote logo or the gear at the top of the board to open Settings.
04 Writing a note
Tap New on the rail. Every new note gets a paper color you have not used on your last three notes, so neighbors on the board are easy to tell apart. A note you close without putting anything in it simply goes away.
Give it a label in the Label… line if you like, and write in Write it down… below. If there is no label, the note takes its title from its first line or first checklist item.
Four ways to write
The buttons on the left switch how the note is written:
- Text: an ordinary note.
- Checklist: tap a box to tick an item, press Return for the next one, or tap Add an item. Tap the x on an item to remove it.
- Split: text above a checklist, for a note that needs both.
- Draw: sketch with your finger or Apple Pencil. The eraser button clears the whole sketch.
The tool row
The buttons on the right of the note, which scroll sideways on smaller iPhones:
- Text size: make the writing bigger or smaller.
- Color: six paper colors.
- Bell: a reminder (see Reminders).
- Microphone: record onto this note.
- Camera and Photos: add pictures and videos.
- Sparkles: write a summary. It appears once the note has a recording or video with words in it.
- Folder: choose where the note lives.
- Pin: tack the note to a place.
Tap Board at the top left to close the note. Everything saves as you go.
Throwing a note away
Tap the trash at the top of a note. TackNote asks first, because the note's pictures and recordings go with it.
05 Pictures & videos
Tap the Camera button to take a picture or video straight onto the note, or Photos to add some from your library. They appear in a strip on the note.
- Tap a photo to see it full size. Swipe between photos, pinch or double-tap to zoom, and swipe down or tap Done to close.
- Tap a video to play it full screen.
- Tap the x on a thumbnail to remove it from the note.
When you add a video, TackNote listens to it on your iPhone and writes down what was said. You will find it under What was said in the video.
06 Recording & transcripts
TackNote records meetings, calls and passing thoughts, and writes down what is said as it is said. The words are worked out on your iPhone, so it works on a plane, in a basement, or anywhere without signal.
From the Record tab
- Tap Record on the rail, then the big red button.
- Talk. The words appear as you speak, and a meter shows TackNote can hear you.
- Tap the button again to stop. TackNote turns the recording into a new note and opens it.
Onto a note you already have
Open the note and tap the microphone. When you stop, the transcript is added to the end of the note's text, or as a new item if the note is a checklist. If you close the note while it is still recording, the recording finishes onto that note.
Reading and using a transcript
Each recording on a note has a play button, its length and the start of what was said. Tap the words to read the whole transcript, where you can select text, Copy it, or Add to note. Adding never replaces what you already wrote. Press and hold a recording for the same choices.
The first time you record, your iPhone may need a minute to fetch its speech model, and TackNote shows Getting the language model ready… while it does.
If TackNote closes mid-recording
Nothing is lost. The next time you open TackNote it says We got your recording back and saves what it had as a note labeled Recovered recording. Tap Open it to go straight there.
07 Summaries
Once a note has a recording or a video with words in it, a sparkles button appears in its tool row. Tap it and TackNote writes a summary at the top of the note: a short overview, then Decisions and To do. The transcript and the recording stay exactly as they were.
Summaries are written by Apple's on-device model, on your iPhone, and are marked written on this iPhone, not sent anywhere. They need an iPhone that supports Apple Intelligence, with Apple Intelligence turned on in the Settings app.
08 Folders
Notes can live in a project, and inside a project in a sub-folder. Anything you do not file stays on the board.
- Make a project: tap Folders on the rail and type a name under Make a project.
- Add a sub-folder: type it under the project in the same sheet.
- Rename or take away a project: tap its … button. Taking a project away never deletes its notes. They go back to the board.
- File a note: open it and tap the folder button, or drag its card onto a chip on the board.
09 Reminders
Open a note, tap the bell, choose a day and time, and tap Set. When it is due, your iPhone shows a notification with the note's title and Your note is due. Tap it to open the note.
The reminder shows on the note with its date and time. Tap its x to clear it.
10 Places
Tack a note to a place and it waits there for you. The paint color, at the hardware store. The gate code, at the gate. The thing you always forget, at the door you always forget it behind.
Tacking a note to a place
- Stand where the note belongs, open it, and tap the pin.
- Give the place a name under Call it something, such as "The hardware store".
- Use How close is close enough? to choose how near you need to be, from 50 to 500 meters. 150 meters suits most shops and buildings.
- Tap Tack it here.
A note is tacked to where you are standing when you tap the button. To move it, stand at the new spot and tap Move it here. Untack this note removes the place.
Getting place alerts with TackNote closed
The first time you tack a note, TackNote asks to use your location while the app is open. For a note to find you when TackNote is closed, set location to Always:
- Open the Settings app and tap Apps, then TackNote.
- Tap Location and choose Always.
The Places tab tells you which you have: Your notes can reach you anywhere means Always, and Notes reach you while TackNote is open means only while it is open.
The Places tab
Tacked here lists every note with a place, nearest first, and what TackNote is doing about each one:
- Watching, or Watching · 300 m away: ready to tell you when you arrive.
- You are here now: you are inside its circle.
- Too far away right now. It will start watching as you get closer. iPhone lets an app watch a limited number of places at once, so TackNote watches the 18 nearest and swaps them as you move.
- Not watching yet: location is off for TackNote.
Where notes were written
Separately from places, TackNote can remember where each new note was written and show them on a map under Places > Where written. It is off until you turn on Remember where notes are written in Settings. Only notes written after you turn it on appear, and the spot never changes once a note is made. The location stays inside the same encrypted note.
11 Sending a note
Tap the Share button at the top of a note and choose how to send it:
- Send to a TackNote user: a single .tacknote file that keeps everything, including the color, ticks, place, folder, pictures and recordings. Whoever opens it in TackNote on their iPhone or Android phone gets the whole note.
- Send as a PDF: a tidy document with the title, date, place, text, checklist, pictures and transcripts. Videos appear as a still frame, and sketches are not included.
- Share as text and files: the words as plain text, plus the actual photos, videos, recordings and an image of the sketch.
12 Syncing with your Mac
If you use TackNote on a Mac, your notes can travel between your iPhone and your Mac through your own iCloud. There is no account with us and no server of ours in between.
- Make sure your Mac has TackNote 1.4 or later, and both devices are signed in to the same iCloud account.
- On your iPhone, open Settings in TackNote and turn on Sync with my Mac.
- Your iPhone notes arrive on your Mac's TackBoard, under From phone, where you can tack each one to whatever it belongs to on the Mac.
Notes go both ways, and edits follow them. When a note was changed on both, the most recent edit wins, and a note thrown away on one side is thrown away on the other.
How your synced notes are protected
The line under the switch tells you which protection your notes have:
- On, end-to-end encrypted: each note is sealed on your iPhone with your own key from iCloud Keychain before it leaves, so neither we nor Apple can read it.
- On, with iCloud's standard protection: your notes use iCloud's normal protection. When TackNote on your Mac turns on end-to-end encryption, your iPhone switches over by itself.
- Waiting for your sync key from iCloud Keychain: your Mac has made a key, and nothing is sent or received until it reaches this iPhone. If it does not arrive, turn on iCloud Keychain for this iPhone in the Settings app: tap your name, then iCloud. TackNote checks again every time you open it.
Sync now and Send everything again
TackNote syncs on its own when you open it and when your Mac changes something. Sync now checks right away. Send everything again sends every note once more, which is useful after setting up a new Mac. It updates the copies already there rather than making duplicates.
13 Backups & a new iPhone
Your notes are part of your iPhone's normal iCloud Backup. The key that opens them is tied to the iPhone it came from, which keeps them safe, and means a backup restored onto a different iPhone brings the notes but not their key.
Keep a recovery key in iCloud Keychain
To make sure your notes open on a new iPhone, turn on Keep a recovery key in iCloud Keychain in Settings. A copy of the key is then kept in your iCloud Keychain, which Apple encrypts end to end, so neither we nor Apple can read it. It needs iCloud Keychain to be on for your iPhone. Turning the switch off removes the copy.
Moving to a new iPhone with Quick Start, or from an encrypted backup on your computer, brings the key along anyway.
"Some notes could not be opened"
If you set up an iPhone from a backup that could not bring the key, TackNote tells you, and sets those notes aside exactly as they are. Nothing is deleted. Then:
- If the recovery key switch was on, the notes open by themselves as soon as the key arrives, and TackNote says Your notes are back.
- If you sync with your Mac, turn on sync and your synced notes come back from iCloud.
- If your old iPhone still has the notes, turn on the recovery key switch on both iPhones, and they will open on the new one.
14 Trial & unlock
TackNote is free for 7 days with everything turned on. After that, one payment unlocks it for good. There is no subscription. The price is shown in the App Store and on the Unlock button.
- In the last few days of your trial, a strip above the rail counts down. Tap Unlock, or open Settings and tap Unlock or restore.
- If you have bought TackNote before, on this or another device, tap Restore a previous purchase. Family Sharing works too.
When the trial ends
Your notes never go anywhere. TackNote becomes read only: every note still opens, and you can read, search, share and export them all. Writing new notes, editing, and adding recordings, pictures, reminders and places wait until you unlock.
15 Your privacy
- Encrypted on your iPhone. Your notes, pictures, videos and recordings are encrypted on your iPhone.
- No account. There is nothing to sign up for, and your notes are never sent to us.
- On-device listening. Transcripts and summaries are worked out on your iPhone.
- Your location stays yours. Places and where-written spots stay on your iPhone, inside your encrypted notes, and travel only to your own Mac if you sync.
- Sync stays yours. Sync uses your own iCloud, and is off until you turn it on.
- No tracking. TackNote has no ads and no trackers.
Read the full privacy policy.
16 When something goes wrong
- Microphone access is off. Turn on the microphone for TackNote in the Settings app, under Apps > TackNote.
- Transcription is not available for this language on this iPhone. Your iPhone has no on-device speech model for its current language. The recording itself is kept.
- Turn on Apple Intelligence in Settings to summarise a recording. Summaries use Apple Intelligence. Turn it on in the Settings app, under Apple Intelligence & Siri.
- The on-device model is still downloading. Your iPhone is still fetching it. Try again in a little while.
- There is not enough here to summarise. A summary needs more than a sentence or two of transcript.
- No iCloud account is signed in on this iPhone. Sync needs iCloud. Sign in under your name at the top of the Settings app.
- Could not reach the App Store to fetch the price. Check your connection and open Unlock again.
- A tacked note did not alert me. Check the Places tab. If it says Notes reach you while TackNote is open, set location to Always (see Places), and check notifications are on for TackNote.
17 Getting help
Stuck, or have an idea? We would love to hear from you. Email [email protected]. The FAQ answers the most common questions, and the changelog tracks what is new.
Using TackNote on a computer too? The Mac user guide and the Windows user guide cover the desktop apps.