17 free, open-source Bullet Journal apps to boost your productivity

What is Bullet Journal?

Bullet Journal is a multipurpose productivity booster journal-taking method, The journal can be anything from a calendar, a goal tracker, a project manager, activity tracker, to a to-do list.

Originally created by designer Ryder Carroll, Bullet Journal, or as some may refer to as BuJo or Bujo, became the favorite tool for creative people.

In contrast, it is up to you to figure out what and how will you use it.

To learn more about the Bullet Journal method, you need to check out this article: What is Bullet Journal, and how can you use it?

What is Bullet Journal, and how can you use it?

What is Bullet Journal?Bullet Journal is a productive organization method for creative busy minds. It can be a calendar, to-do list, goat tracker, diary, and/ or even a m

MEDevelopment: Open-source medical and enterprise softwareHamza Musa

Why should you want to consider using Bullet Journal?

It is a productive, practical way to plan, organize, track, and map your tasks systematically with little effort.

Bullet Journal is pretty easy to use and does not require a steep learning curve.

Digitized Bullet Journals

Bullet Journals can be digitized as a computer program, a web app, or a mobile app. Some may argue a digitized form will not be effective as a hard copy, but you would not know until you try, right?.

In this article, we present you with a collection of open-source, free Bujo "Bullet Journal" apps, which you can install, set up, and use freely.

Here is our list

1- Bullet Journal platform

This one is a web-based Bullet Journal platform that comes with an extensive features list. It is ideal for personal journaling, notebook keeping, to-do lists, adding schedules and reminders.

Beyond its rich feature set, It offers several collaboration options for teams and small groups. It also allows the user to create unlimited collections and share them with users.

It offers more than a collaboration option for its users, it offers many user-generated bullet journal templates.

You can install this app using Docker either on your local machine or a remote server.

Here is a video introduction about Bullet Journal Platform

GitHub - singerdmx/BulletJournal: An organizational system that helps you keep track of everything in your busy life

An organizational system that helps you keep track of everything in your busy life - GitHub - singerdmx/BulletJournal: An organizational system that helps you keep track of everything in your busy…

GitHubsingerdmx

2- Bullet Buddy

Bullet Buddy is a simple straightforward web-based digital bullet journal application. It comes with a clean easy-to-use user interface, index page, daily/ monthly log, and calendar view.

Bullet Buddy is a progressive web application that uses the Vue framework.

It can be installed with Docker either on a local or a remote server.

Bullet Buddy: A Free Productivity booster Self-hosted Bullet Journal App for Busy Minds

Bullet Journal is a note-taking, a personal journaling approach that helps you not to miss old records and plan well for the future one. The approach was introduced by Ryder Carroll, who designed it to manage scheduling, reminders, to-do lists, brainstorming and more. If your work is busy with tas…

MEDevel.comHamza Mousa

3- Journapi

Journapi is one of the best apps on this list, because it is simple, comes with a nifty fancy interface, and uses modern technologies and frameworks the TallStack which is a combination of Laravel, Livewire, Tailwind CSS, and Alpine JS.

To have a clear idea about Journapi, you can check its deployed edition, create an account then start adding your journals.

It also offers a headless API with API Key, a command-line interface, and a simple responsive mobile-ready interface.

GitHub - Tahul/journapi: 👨‍💻 Write your bullet journal without breaking your habits

👨‍💻 Write your bullet journal without breaking your habits - GitHub - Tahul/journapi: 👨‍💻 Write your bullet journal without breaking your habits

GitHubTahul

4- Vue Bullet Journal

Vue is a trending JavaScript framework pro building progressive web apps, mobile apps, and desktop apps.

Here, Vue is used to build this fancy Bullet Journal app, which is packed with features and offers a user system with a simple authentication module.

With this unique app, you can follow your habits, manage your collections, and list and set items easily without having breaking a sweat.

GitHub - webmatze/vue-bullet-journal: Created with CodeSandbox

Created with CodeSandbox. Contribute to webmatze/vue-bullet-journal development by creating an account on GitHub.

GitHubwebmatze

5- RocketLog

RocketLog is an open-source (AGPL-3.0), self-hosted, free digitized Bullet Journal application.

RocketLog comes with a straightforward clean interface, and user registration, authentication module that makes your notes (journals) private.

The system is built using the Laravel PHP framework and supports PHP 8.0.

GitHub - jessarcher/rocketlog: Your digital bullet journal

Your digital bullet journal. Contribute to jessarcher/rocketlog development by creating an account on GitHub.

GitHubjessarcher

6- Dijibu

Dijibu is a digitized bullet journal application that aims to provide a simple alternative to analog habit trackers and bullet journal notes.

It is built using React and features a calendar, simple note (journal) adding, a mood tracker, a purchase tracker, and an exercise tracker.

Dijibu is the only project on this list that offers visual charts to track your progress.

However, it is not open-source, even though the source code is published on GitHub.

GitHub - breaclark/dijibu: Digital Bullet Journal Personal Project

Digital Bullet Journal Personal Project. Contribute to breaclark/dijibu development by creating an account on GitHub.

GitHubbreaclark

7- Flamingo Journal

Flamingo Journal is yet another free, open-source personal Bullet Journal that uses HTML, CSS, and JavaScript.

Although the project is archived, you can still download and use it on your local machine with the help of a local server.

GitHub - FlamingoJournal/Bullet-Journal-App: A Bullet Journaling web application made for CSE 110 at UCSD.

A Bullet Journaling web application made for CSE 110 at UCSD. - GitHub - FlamingoJournal/Bullet-Journal-App: A Bullet Journaling web application made for CSE 110 at UCSD.

GitHubFlamingoJournal

8- HTML Bullet Journal

In one single HTML file, this Bullet Journal with offers a simple GUI which lists the weekdays, and monthly log, and next month incoming journals.

Unfortunately, it is not designed as a progressive web app and there is no means to save or export your journals.

GitHub - bastianallgeier/bulletjournal: A simple HTML bullet journal

A simple HTML bullet journal. Contribute to bastianallgeier/bulletjournal development by creating an account on GitHub.

GitHubbastianallgeier

9- Digitized Bullet Journal

An old Node.js Bullet Journal project, which did not receive updates for years. It uses Ember.js which ensures the app's reactivity and usability.

GitHub - jnschrag/bullet-journal: A personal project to develop a digital version of the bullet journal system.

A personal project to develop a digital version of the bullet journal system. - GitHub - jnschrag/bullet-journal: A personal project to develop a digital version of the bullet journal system.

GitHubjnschrag

10- Bujo-Fail

Bujo-fail is an open-source web-based Node.js Bullet Journal app. It uses the Express framework, React, and MongoDB.

GitHub - centanomics/bujo-fail: An online version of the bullet journal method

An online version of the bullet journal method. Contribute to centanomics/bujo-fail development by creating an account on GitHub.

GitHubcentanomics

11- Markdown Bullet Journal

Markdown is a simple lightweight markup language that you can write using any text editor. This project makes use of Markdown as a Python script that allows you to create an organized Bullet Journal markdown file in no time.

GitHub - fulgor/bulletjournal.md: Bullet Journal in an plain textfile with Markdown formatting

Bullet Journal in an plain textfile with Markdown formatting - GitHub - fulgor/bulletjournal.md: Bullet Journal in an plain textfile with Markdown formatting

GitHubfulgor

12- Online Rails BuJo

A web-based Bullet Journal solution that uses Rails (Ruby on Rails) and React for the frontend. It helps you to record tasks, notes, events and follow everything at home for upcoming events.

GitHub - cavu757/bullet-projects-app: Online bullet journal using a Rails backend and a React frontend. Record tasks, notes, events. Home page has upcoming events. Final project for Flatiron Course

Online bullet journal using a Rails backend and a React frontend. Record tasks, notes, events. Home page has upcoming events. Final project for Flatiron Course - GitHub - cavu757/bullet-projects-…

GitHubcavu757

13- Thoth

Thoth is a free, Bullet Journal application built with Django, Python, and TypeScript.

You can install it either from scratch or using Docker. The installation instructions are clear, but there is no working demo nor screenshots for how does it look like.

GitHub - bramz/thoth: A bullet journal application

A bullet journal application. Contribute to bramz/thoth development by creating an account on GitHub.

GitHubbramz

14- MicroBullet (CLI)

MicroBullet is a command-line Bullet Journal (BuJo) application, written in the Go programming language. With it, you can create notes (journals), or tasks with simple commands.

GitHub - lojikil/microbullet: a microscopic bullet journal

a microscopic bullet journal . Contribute to lojikil/microbullet development by creating an account on GitHub.

GitHublojikil

15- Tioga

Tioga is a digital web-based Bullet Journal application, that uses Ruby on Rails, React, and PostgreSQL. Even though it was not updated for more than 6 years, but you can download and use it on your machine with the support of Docker.

GitHub - dpaola2/Tioga: Open source, digital bullet journal

Open source, digital bullet journal. Contribute to dpaola2/Tioga development by creating an account on GitHub.

GitHubdpaola2

16- Progressive Bullet Journal

This one is a free, open-source React-based Bullet Journal application that uses the Bootstrap CSS framework.

It does not come with any clear documentation, but any Node.js or React developer can download and build it easily.

GitHub - Raigecki/BulletJournal: Progressive Web App + iOS App that replicates the design and functionality of bullet journals with React.js

Progressive Web App + iOS App that replicates the design and functionality of bullet journals with React.js - GitHub - Raigecki/BulletJournal: Progressive Web App + iOS App that replicates the desi…

GitHubRaigecki

17- Flutter Bullet Journal

Flutter is a trending Dart framework for building mobile, web, and desktop applications. This is an open-source Flutter-based Bullet Journal for Journapi application.

You can download the source code, build it for mobile, or modify it if you are a Flutter developer.

GitHub - ChangJoo-Park/journapi_flutter

Contribute to ChangJoo-Park/journapi_flutter development by creating an account on GitHub.

GitHubChangJoo-Park

Our recommendation

As you may notice, we listed everything we found, however, some of them are not ready for production or suitable for non-technical users. So, here is our recommendations:

1. Bullet Buddy (#2)
2. Vue Bullet Journal apps (#4)
3. Bullet Journal platform (#1)

Wrapping up

Bullet Journal is a creative productive organization method for busy creative brains. However, it does not have to use hard copy material notes, it can be digitized. Therefore, we covered several BuJo open-source projects which you can download and use freely.

If you know of any other open-source, free Bullet Journal app that we did not list here, let us know.