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support@beanotes.appBeanotes is a privacy-focused note-taking app designed to help you capture and cherish moments about the people who matter most. Whether it's birthdays, conversations, or special memories, Beanotes helps you organize notes by person so you can maintain meaningful relationships.
Download Beanotes from the App Store, create an account using your phone number, and start creating "beings" (people in your life) to take notes about. You can choose to keep your data local on your device or store it in the cloud to access across multiple devices. Local data stays local and is never synced to the cloud.
Beanotes is currently free to use during our launch period. We'll announce any pricing changes well in advance.
Privacy is at the core of Beanotes. By default, all your data is stored locally on your device. When you create data in the cloud, your notes and moments are encrypted end-to-end using AES-256 encryption, meaning we cannot read them. Local data never leaves your device. We never sell your data or use it for advertising.
Local storage keeps all your data exclusively on your device—we have no access to it and it never leaves your device. Cloud storage creates and stores your data in the cloud, making it accessible across your iOS devices. Notes and moments stored in the cloud are encrypted so only you can read them. Being names, birthdays, and relationship types stored in the cloud are not encrypted to enable core app functionality and collaboration features. Local and cloud data are separate—local data is never synced to the cloud.
No. If you keep data local, it never leaves your device and we have no access to it. If you store data in the cloud, your notes and moments are encrypted end-to-end, so we cannot read them. Only you have access to your encrypted content.
If you have data stored in the cloud, you can access it on a new device by logging in with your Beanotes account. To decrypt your data, you'll need your decryption PIN, which is automatically stored in iCloud Keychain. If you use the same iCloud account, your PIN will be available automatically. If you use a different iCloud account, you can still access your data if you remember or have saved your PIN separately. Without your PIN (and without iCloud Keychain access), your encrypted cloud data will be permanently inaccessible. If you only use local storage, your data will be lost unless you have a device backup through iCloud or iTunes.
Beings are the people, animals, or anything you care about that you want to take notes about in Beanotes. Each being has their own profile where you can add their name, birthday, relationship type, and take notes and capture moments about them. Beings can be family members, friends, pets, or anyone or anything meaningful to you.
Yes! You can add photos to both notes and moments to help capture and remember special occasions and memories. Adding photos is a premium feature.
Notes are flexible text entries for capturing thoughts, conversations, and details. Moments are special dated memories with photos that help you remember significant occasions and experiences.
Yes! Beanotes includes collaboration features that let you share notes with trusted people and take notes together. You maintain full control over what you share and with whom.
Ask AI is a beta feature that provides quick summaries and insights about your notes. It's designed to help you find information quickly and understand patterns in your relationships. All AI processing happens completely on your device—your queries and notes never leave your phone.
Absolutely. Ask AI processes everything locally on your device. Your notes, questions, and AI responses never leave your phone. We don't collect, store, or transmit any of your AI interactions. This complete on-device processing ensures your privacy but may consume more battery and take longer than cloud-based AI services.
Because notes stored in the cloud are end-to-end encrypted, Ask AI can only process them when you explicitly specify which people's notes to query using @mentions. For local notes, no mentions are needed as they're already accessible on your device.
Ask AI runs advanced machine learning models entirely on your device to protect your privacy. This CPU-intensive processing may temporarily increase your phone's temperature and battery usage. This is the trade-off we made to ensure your notes never need to be sent to external servers.
When creating or editing a being, note, or moment, you can choose to store it in the cloud or keep it local. Cloud-stored data is accessible across all your devices, while local data stays only on the device where you created it. Local data is never synced to the cloud—they remain separate.
When you store data in the cloud, your notes and moments are encrypted end-to-end using AES-256 encryption. However, being names, birthdays, and relationship types are not encrypted, as they need to be accessible for the app to function properly across devices and for collaboration features.
Yes! You can export all your data from Beanotes at any time in a standard format. Go to Settings > Export Data to download your information.
When you delete your account, your cloud-stored data will be permanently deleted from our servers within 30 days. Any local data on your device will remain until you delete the app or manually remove it.
Your decryption PIN is automatically stored in iCloud Keychain for convenience and security. Using the same iCloud account on all your devices means your PIN is automatically available to decrypt your data. However, if you switch to a different iCloud account, you can still access your cloud data by manually entering your PIN—as long as you remember it or have saved it somewhere safe. For safety, we recommend storing your PIN in a secure password manager or other safe location as a backup. Without your PIN and without iCloud Keychain access, your encrypted data cannot be decrypted, even by us.
Your PIN is automatically stored in iCloud Keychain, but we strongly recommend saving it in a second secure location as a backup. You can store it in a password manager (like 1Password, Bitwarden, or Apple Passwords), write it down and keep it in a safe place, or store it in another secure notes app. Having a backup ensures you can always access your cloud data, even if you switch iCloud accounts or lose access to your iCloud Keychain. You can find the PIN for each cloud-stored being on their individual being page in the app.
Only data that you explicitly choose to store in the cloud is accessible across devices. Local data stays on the device where it was created and is never synced. If you want data available on all your devices, make sure to store it in the cloud when creating or editing it. Check that you're logged into the same account and have an active internet connection.
If you're using Ask AI, note that it's CPU intensive and may temporarily slow performance. Otherwise, try closing other apps, ensuring you have the latest version of Beanotes, and restarting your device. If issues persist, contact support.
Beanotes uses phone number authentication, so there's no password to remember. Simply enter your phone number during login, and we'll send you a verification code.
We love hearing from our users! Please email us at support@beanotes.app with details about bugs or feature suggestions. Your feedback helps us make Beanotes better for everyone.
We're here to help. Reach out to our support team and we'll get back to you as soon as possible.
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