The Diary.com tour
Every section of your private diary and everything it does today. Tap Ask anywhere for an instant answer.
01 · Section
My Diary
Your private journal: write, talk, or add a photo, video or voice note, with a daily prompt, mood, streaks and a Today page that keeps your day together.
- The Today page
- Today greets you with quick actions (write, voice, photo, video, AI chat, quick note), a Today checklist, local weather if you add a city, your week of moods, your writing streak, a mood check-in, recent memories, the daily prompt, On This Day, upcoming birthdays and anniversaries, your Gratitude Jar and Life Twin shortcuts.
- Writing an entry
- The editor has bold, italic, underline, headings, quotes, lists and links. Add a title, date and time, entry type (journal, memory, note or gratitude), mood, tags, people and a place. Attach photos, videos and voice notes. Every save keeps the previous version in revision history so you can restore it. If you lose your connection, the draft stays on your device and appears under "Drafts on this device".
- Daily prompts
- A new writing prompt appears on Today every morning, and the public journal prompts page has hundreds more grouped by theme (gratitude, reflection, memories, relationships, goals, legacy). You can switch the daily prompt off in Settings.
- Timeline, Life Replay and On This Day
- Timeline shows every entry by month with a year filter. Life Replay plays your moments full-screen in order. On This Day on the Today page brings back what you wrote on this date in earlier years.
- Search everything
- Search finds entries, people, places, goals, voice-note transcripts, vault titles and #tags. The search index stores keyed fingerprints, not readable words. Locked entries are never searchable.
- Importing from other apps
- Import photos (dated from their camera data) and notes from text or Markdown files, Day One JSON exports and Evernote .enex files.
- Journal types
- Give any entry a journal type: gratitude, prayer and faith, fitness, work, school, creative, recovery, grief, parenting, relationships, finance, goals, travel, dreams, food, sleep, health or your own custom journal. Each type has a starter prompt, and you can filter your journal by type.
- Special diaries
- Diaries (under My Diary) has a pet diary (pets with birthday or gotcha-day reminders), trip diaries (one per trip, with a trip book), a kids growth book, heirlooms and family recipes (with a recipe template), friends and family grouped by how you know them, and time capsules. Each can be turned into a Life Book PDF.
- Good days and hard days
- Mark today as a good day or a hard day from the mood card on Today. Highlights shows your good-day streak and a 13-week calendar. On hard days you get a gentle nudge to write it out or shake the Gratitude Jar, plus support resources (in the US and Canada, call or text 988 any time).
- Planner and calendar
- Planner: a month calendar (drag events to move them), the next 7 days, repeating events with reminders, to-dos with projects and due dates, birthdays from People, and .ics export, import and a private subscribe link for Google, Apple or Outlook calendars. My day on Today shows what is on.
- Writing tools
- The editor has colours, handwriting and serif fonts, checklists, tables, undo and redo, clean pasting, a focus mode, a daily word goal, morning pages (750 words), a reporter notebook and a sketch pad that works with a stylus.
- Trash: restore or delete for good
- When you delete an entry, photo, video, voice note or story film, it moves to Trash (Journal or Memories > Trash, or diary.com/app/trash) and waits there for 30 days. Open Trash to restore it exactly as it was, with its photos, tags and search, or tap Delete for good to remove it right away, files included. Empty Trash removes everything in it. After 30 days items are deleted for good automatically. Deleting a story film never deletes the photos and videos you made it from. Items in Trash do not count against your storage.
- Delete several entries at once
- Open Journal and tap Select. Tap the entries you want to remove, or tick "Select all" for every entry shown (load older entries first to include them), then tap Delete. You have 10 seconds to tap Undo; after that the entries are deleted. Their photos and videos stay in Memories, where you can delete them too. To delete one entry, open it and use More > Delete entry. To delete all your entries at once, use Settings > Your data.
02 · Section
Memories & Media
Photos, videos and voice notes in one private library, with transcripts, favorites and the stories behind every picture.
- Your private media library
- Memories holds every photo, video and voice note you upload. Media is stored privately and served only to you, or to a family space you shared it with. Open any item to add a caption, read a voice-note transcript, download the original, delete it or write about it.
- Voice notes and transcription
- Record a voice note in the editor and it is transcribed into text you can search (processed privately by our speech-to-text service). Transcription can be switched off in Settings, and Locked entries never use it. Each plan includes monthly transcription minutes.
- Transcripts for voice notes and videos
- Videos and voice notes are transcribed automatically after you add them (unless transcription is off in Settings). Transcripts have timestamps you can tap to jump to that moment, you can edit them, and search finds what was said. Memories also has a Transcribe button for older items.
- Favorites
- Star any entry to make it a favorite. Filter your journal by favorites, and favorites are picked first for Life Books and happy-memory answers.
- Highlights: milestones, favorites reel and moments
- Highlights (under Memories & Media) gathers your milestones on a timeline, plays a favorites reel of everything you starred, and sorts moments you tag as humorous, sentimental, proud, adventures, firsts, lessons or family, each with its own reel (the humorous one is your laugh reel). Mark milestones and moments under the entry editor.
- Shelves
- Shelves are your own named collections, like "Grandpa's stories" or "Summer 2026". Create them in Highlights > Shelves and add entries from the editor. Shelf names are encrypted.
- Smart uploads
- When you add photos and videos, Diary.com reads the date each photo was taken, sorts them into days and shows a review screen where you can untick anything and name each day. Photos already in your diary are spotted and unticked. If you turn on "Use photo locations" in Settings, locations saved in your photos suggest a place; it is off by default.
- Bring a photo to life
- On a saved entry, tap the sparkle on a photo to turn it into a short 5 or 10 second animated clip. You see a suggested camera move you can edit, the price in Diary credits and your balance before you confirm. Inputs are checked for safety first, the clip is labelled as an AI animation, and if anything fails your credits are returned. Never available for Locked entries.
03 · Section
People & Places
The people who matter and the places that shaped you: birthdays, anniversaries, notes and a private map of your life.
- People
- Keep notes, birthdays and anniversaries for the people in your life. Entries that mention someone by first name are linked to them automatically, and each person page lists your shared memories. You get reminders before and on the day.
- Places
- Search any town or landmark, or tap the map to drop a pin, then attach entries, photos and videos to it. Your location is never collected in the background.
04 · Section
Goals & Wellbeing
Habits, goals, moods and gratitude side by side with your journal, so patterns become obvious and progress feels real.
- Goals and habits
- Track daily or weekly habits with streaks, best streaks and a 14-day view, and bigger goals with a target and progress bar. The Free plan includes 3 active goals and habits; paid plans include more.
- Moods
- Check in with one tap on Today, add a mood to any entry, and see a 30-day mood chart on the Goals page.
- Gratitude Jar
- Drop in a small thank-you any time. On a hard day, shake the jar to pull out a random one.
- Reminders and notifications
- Choose a daily journaling reminder time and days, birthday and anniversary reminders, and quiet hours. Reminders arrive as push notifications on devices you allow, with email as a fallback, and everything is listed in the notification center.
- Health diary
- Goals & Wellbeing > Health diary: log symptoms, medications with reminder times (and tap Taken), appointments, vitals such as weight, blood pressure, glucose and sleep (with charts), exercise, cycles, allergies, vaccination records and scanned documents, then print a summary for a doctor visit. It is for your own records: Diary.com does not diagnose or give medical advice. The Food tab logs meals and drinks with hunger, fullness and how you felt, plus water glasses (general information only, no diet advice); the Sleep tab logs bedtime, wake time, how rested you feel and wake-ups with a chart, and can link a dream from your Dreams journal.
05 · Section
Life Twin AI
A private AI that answers questions about your life from your own diary, with links to the entries it used.
- What Life Twin does
- Life Twin answers questions about your own life using only your own diary: summarize your week, find your happiest memories, help with goals, plan a trip or a family movie. It cites the entries it used, says plainly when it does not see something, and never pretends to be a person.
- Life Twin and your privacy
- Life Twin searches a private index inside your account. Your words are never used to train AI models and nothing is shared with other users. Locked entries are never read. You can switch AI memory off in Settings at any time.
- Which AI models
- Free accounts use our everyday AI. Plus, Life and Family use our deeper AI, and Life and Family add a monthly allowance of deeper answers from our deepest AI. Each plan has a monthly number of Life Twin messages.
- Safety
- If you write about wanting to harm yourself, Life Twin stops and shares the 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline (call or text 988 in the US and Canada). If you are in immediate danger, call 911 or your local emergency number. Life Twin is not a therapist, doctor, lawyer or financial adviser.
- What Life Twin remembers, and deleting it
- Life Twin answers from your diary entries and your chat with it. To make it forget a message, tap the small trash icon on that message. To clear the whole conversation, tap the trash icon at the top of Life Twin. To stop Life Twin using your diary at all, turn off AI memory in Settings. Deleting entries also removes them from what Life Twin can see.
06 · Section
Create
Turn memories into Life Books, Memory Movies, Future Letters and short animated clips from your photos.
- Life Books
- Choose dates, entry types and favorites and download a beautifully typeset PDF with your photos and a cover, ready to print anywhere. Printed and bound books are planned for later.
- Memory Movies
- Pick a date range and your photos and captions become a gentle cinematic slideshow with slow camera moves. Watch it full-screen or download it as a video file.
- Future Letters
- Write a letter to yourself or anyone with an email address and choose the day it is delivered, from minutes to decades ahead. Edit or cancel it any time before it is sent; delivered letters stay in your diary.
- Diary credits
- Creative extras such as bringing a photo to life are paid with Diary credits. You see the price and your balance before you confirm, and failed jobs refund automatically. Credit packs are bought with a card through secure embedded checkout once card payments are connected.
07 · Section
Family
Private, invite-only family spaces to share stories, photos and videos with the people you love.
- Family spaces
- Create a family space and invite relatives by email; each invitation works only for that email address. Members post stories and photos that everyone in the space can see. Owners can revoke invites and remove members, and anyone can leave. Your personal diary always stays private unless you choose to share a memory.
- Safety in shared spaces
- Anything you share with other people is checked automatically before others see it. Your private diary is never reviewed. You can see decisions and appeal them in Settings.
- Sharing a moment
- Each entry has an optional share button that hands the words to your own device's share sheet or copies them, so you decide exactly where they go. Nothing gets a public link. You can hide share buttons in Settings. To send something to a person directly, use Send (see Messages).
- Family tree
- Family > Family tree: build it just by telling your story ("my mom's dad was Jack, born 1931 in Ohio"); AI proposes the people and relationships and you add them. Or add people by hand with dates, places, sources and how sure you are, including adopted, step and foster relationships. Views: ancestors chart (download as SVG or print), descendants and family group. GEDCOM import and export, impossible-date checks, duplicate merging and research to-dos. Private and encrypted; living people are only ever seen by you.
- Send a verse, a moment or a note
- Send a verse (from any verse block or the verse of the day), a moment from your diary or a note to anyone by email, with your own note. Diary.com members get it in Messages; others get an email from Diary.com with a link to read it and reply. You see when it is read (read receipts can be turned off) and get their thank-you. You can edit your note, unsend it, or delete messages you received. Links and contact details are never allowed in anything other people see.
08 · Section
Legacy
A Vault of letters and wishes for the people you will leave behind, released only through a careful, cancellable process.
- Vault and legacy contacts
- Write letters, wishes and stories, attach photos or video, and choose up to 10 trusted legacy contacts. Access is only ever requested by a contact, never triggered because you stopped logging in. You are notified and can decline during a waiting period you choose (7 to 180 days).
- Time capsules
- Seal a message until a date or a milestone (Diaries > Time capsules). With Locked entries set up, a capsule is sealed end to end: your browser splits the key, one half wrapped by your passphrase and the other kept by us until the opening day, so nobody can read it early, including us. Without Locked entries, capsules are encrypted at rest and our server keeps them closed until the day. Date capsules cannot be opened early; milestone capsules open when you say the moment has come. You get a notification on the day.
09 · Section
Faith & Values
Built on Christian values: kind, honest and never preachy. Optional Scripture in your entries and a daily verse, if you want them.
- Built on Christian values
- Diary.com is built on Christian values. Life Twin is kind, honest, pro-life and biblically informed, and never preachy or pushy. People of every faith, or none, are welcome and respected. It does not write prayers for you unless you ask, and never claims to pray for you.
- Scripture in your entries
- Optional and off until you turn it on in Settings > Faith & Scripture. Then a Verse button in the editor suggests fitting verses from your words (or lets you browse by topic) and adds your choice as a clearly marked block with its reference and translation, World English Bible or King James Version, quoted exactly. Keep it or remove it any time. For Locked entries we never read the words: you browse by topic instead.
- Verse of the day
- Turn on Verse of the day in Settings > Faith & Scripture to see a daily verse on Today with a gentle prompt to write about it.
- Christian mode
- An optional setting, at sign-up or in Settings > Faith & Scripture: a verse of the day and a Scripture-linked prompt on Today, a Pray button, prayer journal, sermon notes and answered-prayer templates (Diaries > Faith), and a Life Twin that talks openly about faith. The standard diary stays welcoming to everyone: it keeps the same values, never preaches, and may gently offer a verse.
- Christian radio
- The small Radio button at the bottom left opens a player for K-LOVE or Air1. It is off until you turn it on, remembers your choice and pauses when a video, voice note or other sound plays.
10 · Section
Privacy & Security
Encryption at rest, end-to-end encrypted Locked entries, passkeys and 2-step verification, and delete or download anything.
- Encryption at rest
- Journal text, notes, people, places, goals, letters, vault items, chats, captions and transcripts are encrypted with AES-256-GCM using a key that belongs to your account alone. Our servers hold those keys so search, Life Twin, exports, letters and reminders can work; staff do not read diaries and we never sell your data.
- Locked entries (end-to-end encrypted)
- Mark an entry Locked and your browser encrypts it with a key made from a passphrase only you know. We store only scrambled text. Search, Life Twin, AI and transcription never touch Locked entries. Keep your one-time recovery key safe: if you lose both the passphrase and the recovery key, nobody can open those entries. "See what we store" shows the exact stored row.
- 2-step verification and passkeys
- Turn on 2-step verification with an authenticator app, passkeys (Face ID, fingerprint, Windows Hello or a security key) and ten one-time backup codes. Sensitive actions ask you to confirm it is you, and every important change sends a security email.
- Download or delete anything
- Settings > Your data lets you export everything as a ZIP (entries as Markdown, original media, transcripts) or JSON, download or delete a single collection, and delete one entry with or without its files. Deleting your account removes your data from our live systems; encrypted backups roll off on a schedule.
- Backups
- Nightly encrypted snapshots of your account are kept in a separate storage bucket for a limited time so your diary can be restored after an accident. Locked entries stay end-to-end encrypted in backups.
- Device privacy lock
- Hide your diary behind a PIN, or Face ID or fingerprint where supported, on each device. It locks after 5 minutes away.
11 · Section
Plans & Account
Free to start, simple plans, Diary credits for creative extras, reminders, notifications and an app you can install.
- What is new
- Every time a new feature goes live you get one note in your notification center (and a push if you turn on Product updates in Settings). The full list is under What is new.
- Delete your account
- To delete your Diary.com account: 1. Open Settings (the gear in the menu, or diary.com/app/settings). 2. If you want a copy first, go to the Your data card in Settings and tap Export. 3. Scroll to the bottom of Settings to the Delete account card and tap "Delete my account and data". 4. Enter your password to confirm (if your account has no password, for example you sign in with a passkey or Google, type DELETE), then tap "Delete permanently". Any subscription is cancelled right away (no more charges) and you are signed out everywhere. Your account and every entry, photo, video, voice note, letter, vault item and Life Twin chat, plus family spaces you own, are permanently deleted 14 days later. Until then you can sign in and tap "Restore my account". We keep only your receipts, because tax law requires it. If you only want to stop paying, cancel your plan in Settings > Plan & billing instead.
- Plans
- Free includes unlimited journaling, 1 GB for media, 10 minutes of transcription and 15 Life Twin messages a month. Plus ($9.99/month, or $79 paid once a year), Life ($24.99/month) and Family ($37.99/month, up to 6 people) add storage, more and smarter AI, full Life Books and Memory Movies and more. Cancel any time; your diary stays yours on Free.
- Billing
- Payments are taken securely by card on a protected payment form. Billing by AZ.com. Your card statement will show AZDOTCOM. Card payments are being connected; until then upgrade buttons say so.
- Install the app
- Diary.com works in any modern browser and installs like an app on iPhone, iPad, Android, Mac and Windows (on iPhone: Safari > Share > Add to Home Screen). There are no separate app-store apps.
- Languages
- The app is fully in English, with Spanish and French for the main menus. More languages are planned.
- Signing in
- Sign in with email and password, or with a passkey. Google sign-in and text-message codes are built and appear once their connections are finished.
- Getting help
- Use the contact form on diary.com/contact for questions, billing or privacy requests. We never publish email addresses.