What is the best single-user wiki?

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17

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Considered

269

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Recs.

28 secs

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Updated

Here’s the Deal

13 Options Considered

Best single-user wiki	Price	Local hosting	Platforms
87 DokuWiki	Free	Yes	-
82 TiddlyWiki	Free	-	Windows, Linux, Mac, iOS, Android
-- Notion	-	No	Windows, macOS, iOS, Web, Android
-- Zim	Free	-	Windows, Linux, Mac
-- VoodooPad 5	FREE/24.99	-	-

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score 44 · Answer 1

DokuWiki

Top Pro

Free and open source

Licensed under GPL2. See More

Top Con

Lots of plugins to manage

DokuWiki is highly modular. Even things like WYSIWYG editors and categories have to be added separately as plugins. This can quickly lead to managing lots of plugins. See More

Specs

Local hosting:Yes

Top Pro

Highly customizable

You can use themes and plugins to extend functionality. See More

Top Con

Too complex for many use-cases

Top Pro

Access control

DokuWiki has built-in ACL support. See More

Top Con

It is very difficult to set up on a linux environment

Top Pro

Good selection of themes

DokuWiki offers over a hundred templates to change the visual appearance of the site. See More

Top Pro

Search functionality

DokuWiki allows searching through pages. See More

Top Pro

Runs on any PHP server

It requires a webserver running PHP 5.2 or later of any kind. See More

Top Pro

Good selection of plugins

DokuWiki offers over a thousand plugins to extend its functionality. See More

Top Pro

Plain-text file storage

Dokuwiki does not require a database, it stores everything in plain-text. See More

Top Pro

Easy to set up and mantain

To install you need a webserver running PHP 5.2 or later where you unpack the downloaded archive and navigate to install.php in your browser, fill out the necessary information required for the one-page installer and you are done. See More

Top Pro

A dedicated page for recent changes

A dedicated page to quickly note what has changed recently can be set up. See More

Top Pro

Version control

Dokuwik offers unlimited page revisions. See More

See All

score 62 · Answer 2

TiddlyWiki

Top Pro

Free and Open Source

No commercial interests, no ads, no registration, no nonsense. You own your notes 100%. See More

Top Con

unintuitive, terrible user interface

just useless See More

MerryHanbi's Experience

Used it for years. Just drop af tiddlywiki html file in a project folder, and you have a nice place for non-code documentation, todo's etc. Accessible just by double-clicking on the html-file. See More

Specs

Platforms:Windows, Linux, Mac, iOS, Android

Top Pro

Self-hosted and indefinitely accessible

All content is stored within the same html file as the interface. See More

Top Con

Relies on browser performance, online or offline

TiddlyWiki is a single HTML file. Thus, if you directly embed e. g large images or videos in it (instead of using the features to display externally stored images and videos) it would make the file big and performance slow. See More

RickZeeland's Experience

A non-linear personal notebook written in JavaScript used as a single HTML file in the browser or as a powerful Node.js application. See More

Top Pro

Single html file

It's a single file and all your notes will be "accessible even in 25 years" because they can be seen in plain html text. See More

Top Con

Without JavaScript nothing is visible

Rizwan Ishak's Experience

It can be run as an HTML file or using an in built node server in which case your information is stored in flat file formats See More

Top Pro

Extremely customizable

This is a major aim and point with TiddlyWiki; people can relatively easily modify it to fit their particular application needs. See More

CulturedOmoikane's Experience

Been using it on and off for years. I love I can store anything I write, and can find it quickly. I have multiple files, each with different types of information. See More

Top Pro

Lots of plugins

BraveTiddalik's Experience

Tiddlywiki is by far the most versatile of all personal Wiki's I know See More

Top Pro

Relational links

Allows for relational links and lists between notes to keep things organized. See More

Top Pro

10+ years mature

Mature software, active community with members from all over the world. See More

Top Pro

Progressive user level, from ease of use to programming your own plugins

Basic users can start with simple note-taking, progressively discover predefined features and existing plugins, then start using more fancy features (like filters, widgets, macros), in order to adapt their wiki to their needs. See More

Top Pro

Multiple, user-defined usages

The list of possible usages is practically infinite in TW, and more importantly it lets the user define their own method of dealing with their content. See More

Top Pro

Easy to use

Low barrier of entry for the non IT knowledgeable. See More

See All

score 5 · Answer 3

Notion

All

1

Specs

Platforms:Windows, macOS, iOS, Web, Android

Collaborative:Yes

Local hosting:No

score 10 · Answer 4

Zim

Top Pro

Good export options

Zim supports HTML, LaTeX, Pandoc Markdown, and RST. This allows ones documents to be easily used in a wide selection of other apps. Plus exporting to html can be easily scripted, and placed in Dropbox, then opened on your mobile device. See More

Stir Fry's Experience

Vim is an excellent client for coding or taking notes, so long as you accept that you are using a test editor not a modern publishing program. One can choose colour themes to apply - some of which help with eye strain when you are working for 8 hrs on a file - but ultimately WYSIWYG. See More

Specs

Platforms:Windows, Linux, Mac

License:GPL

Price:Free

Top Pro

Support for multiple platforms

Windows, Linux, and BSD are supported with their own clients. This is nice for those that use multiple operating systems but still want to use the same app on each. See More

CooperativeEgeria's Experience

Been using it for at least 3 yrs for work and personal use. See More

Top Pro

Plain text data format rather than proprietary

If/when the app is no longer developed (or if the user simply decides to no longer use the application or view/edit it on a non-supported platform), this can still be done with any plain-text editor. See More

Top Pro

Automatically manages files and folders

Zim will automatically create a folder structure that fits your page hierarchy and adds/removes files such as images to/from appropriate folders. See More

Top Pro

Allows for organized, wiki-style navigation

Notes can contain links to other notes, allowing you to reference important information when needed. This way the user can connect and reference many different pages in the app, keeping things clean and structured, unlike Evernote, which makes this a good Evernote alternative. See More

See All

score 16 · Answer 5

VoodooPad 5

Top Pro

A desktop wiki

VoodooPad 5 is focused on use by an individual. It is a mature application. Its polished refinements are based upon many years of user experiences and feedback. See More

Top Con

OS X only

There are no Windows or Linux versions of VoodooPad. See More

Top Pro

Markdown support

You can use Markdown syntax to write your documents. See More

Top Con

Costs $24.99 USD

Price can be found here: http://www.voodoopad.com/ See More

Top Pro

Good task management features

Within the collections palette you'll find "to-dos" that are all @todo entries that you've left across all of your pages. See More

Top Con

Breaks compatibility with VoodooPad 4

VoodooPad 5 uses a new file format that is not backwards compatible. See More

Top Pro

Synchronize via Dropbox

You can utilize Dropbox to keep VoodooPad synchronized across all of your devices and allow for collaboration with other people. See More

Top Pro

Java scriptlet & Event scripts support

To dynamically change HTML, ePub and PDF exports you can use Java scriptlets. To extend the functionality of VoodooPad you can use Event scripts. See More

Top Pro

Export to ePub and PDF

Alongside being able to export a page as HTML, RTFD, Plain Text, or as a Word Document, you can export the whole document as XML, RTFD, Plain Text, .doc, ePub, PDF or to an iOS device via VP Reader. See More

Top Pro

Collections palette

Collections allow creating an organizational structure of your pages. See More

See All

score 11 · Answer 6

WikidPad

Top Pro

Export to HTML built in

Export to HTML built in and can work with Dropbox. See More

PatientHorus's Experience

I downloaded it as a free approximation of Scrivener, an organization and word processing tool for writers. I was able to get it set up with a lot of the same structure: a main page, branching lists of characters, locations, scenes, and so on. Works even better than I thought it would. The learning curve seems steep at first. The startup page on the Help Wiki seems very complicated to begin with. Once I got started on my own Wiki, though, I learned as I went pretty quickly and the organization started to make more sense. It will look like your pages are duplicated even when they're not if you look at the tree on the left, which can be confusing. (Don't do what I did and get bogged down in sub-folders trying to get around that.) Once you figure it out, though, it's pretty easy to use even complex features like linking pictures and transcluding files. 5/5, would recommend. 👍👍 See More

Specs

Platforms:Windows, Linux, Mac

Top Pro

Free

PhilosophicalFurrina's Experience

Intuitive markdown-like syntax -- easy to create well-organized outlines just by typing, without needing toolbars or menus for formatting. Excellent performance, no lag in display, navigation or startup. Open source python project. Works on linux from source code + wxgtk. See More

Top Pro

Instant cross-referencing methods

On the fly WikiWord linking, as you type. See More

Top Pro

No remote server needed, or wanted

Top Pro

Quick, auto-saving, and auto-organizing

Auto-organizing with URL and file linking, and instant new-page methods. See More

Top Pro

Data is stored in standard Text files

Data can be viewed, edited, searched, exported easily, and can work with Git. See More

See All

score 12 · Answer 7

WackoWiki

Platforms:Windows, Linux, Mac

score 4 · Answer 8

Wikidot

Top Pro

Support backup

Top Con

Text editor are classic

Top Pro

Can search in admin panel for faster access

Top Pro

Lot of community themes

Top Pro

Fast

See All

score 3 · Answer 9

Tomboy

Top Pro

Free and open source

All the components are free, opensource, and allows self-hosting the sync server. See More

Top Con

Can't easily install on Windows 7

Specs

Platforms:Windows; OSX; Linux

Tables:No

See All

score 5 · Answer 10

Zim Wiki w/ journal plugin

Top Con

poor UI

unintuitive, ugly See More

DaringIdiyanale's Experience

It's not the best-of-the-best, but it is easy to use, and does the job! I have the directory included in my Dropbox area, so it propagates to all of my servers. The updates are pretty much automagic, so updates made by one of us on one laptop show up on the others without anything being done. It might take a few minutes, but that is as much a part of Dropbox as anything. If you want top-of-the-line, enterprise-grade wiki, then you are looking in the wrong place. If you want an it-will-do-what-you-need, small business wiki, then you are here. See More

score 2 · Answer 11

Gollum

Top Pro

Syntax highlighting for source code snippets

Top Con

Requires local Ruby/Python setup.

Top Pro

Supports UML Sequence Diagrams

Top Con

No mobile apps.

Top Pro

Supports MathJax rendering

Top Pro

Cross-platform (desktop/workstation/server; not mobile)

Any Unix-like system. See More

Top Pro

Git-backed

Uses git for version history. See More

See All

score 3 · Answer 12

MDwiki

Top Con

Discontinued

Seems to be discontinued as of October 2018. See More

Top Pro

Possibly more secure on web server

Due to the lack of a built-in editor MDwiki may be less susceptible to spam and defacement compared to other options when served from a web server. See More

Top Con

External program must be used for editing

A separate program must be used to make changes to documents as MDwiki lacks a built-in editor. See More

Top Pro

Doesn't require a web server

MDwiki is a self-contained JavaScript app that is very fast and can run in some web browsers such as Mozilla Firefox. See More

Top Con

Requires additional permissions in Google Chrome

Supposedly, you can get it to work in Google Chrome by modifying JavaScript permissions, but these same changes may decrease security. See More

See All

score 2 · Answer 13

ConnectedText

Top Pro

Desktop wiki with many unique features

Top Con

Basically abandoned on development side

Last update 2015, lack of response from developer. See More

LovelyPrabhasa's Experience

Very solid tool, enough power for my demands See More

ReceptiveDalia's Experience

It has a high learning curve but has features that no other personal wiki has. See More

See All

score 9 · Answer 14

13 Options Considered

My Recommendation for DokuWiki

My Recommendation for DokuWiki

Free and open source

Lots of plugins to manage

Highly customizable

Too complex for many use-cases

Access control

It is very difficult to set up on a linux environment

Good selection of themes

Search functionality

Runs on any PHP server

Good selection of plugins

Plain-text file storage

Easy to set up and mantain

A dedicated page for recent changes

Version control

My Recommendation for TiddlyWiki

My Recommendation for TiddlyWiki

Free and Open Source

unintuitive, terrible user interface

Self-hosted and indefinitely accessible

Relies on browser performance, online or offline

Single html file

Without JavaScript nothing is visible

Extremely customizable

Lots of plugins

Relational links

10+ years mature

Progressive user level, from ease of use to programming your own plugins

Multiple, user-defined usages

Easy to use

My Recommendation for Notion

My Recommendation for Notion

My Recommendation for Zim

My Recommendation for Zim

Good export options

Support for multiple platforms

Plain text data format rather than proprietary

Automatically manages files and folders

Allows for organized, wiki-style navigation

My Recommendation for VoodooPad 5

My Recommendation for VoodooPad 5

A desktop wiki

OS X only

Markdown support

Costs $24.99 USD

Good task management features

Breaks compatibility with VoodooPad 4

Synchronize via Dropbox

Java scriptlet & Event scripts support

Export to ePub and PDF

Collections palette

My Recommendation for WikidPad

My Recommendation for WikidPad

Export to HTML built in

Free

Instant cross-referencing methods

No remote server needed, or wanted

Quick, auto-saving, and auto-organizing

Data is stored in standard Text files

My Recommendation for WackoWiki

My Recommendation for WackoWiki

My Recommendation for Wikidot

My Recommendation for Wikidot

Support backup

Text editor are classic

Can search in admin panel for faster access

Lot of community themes

Fast

My Recommendation for Tomboy

My Recommendation for Tomboy

Free and open source

Can't easily install on Windows 7

My Recommendation for Zim Wiki w/ journal plugin

My Recommendation for Zim Wiki w/ journal plugin

poor UI

My Recommendation for Gollum

My Recommendation for Gollum

Syntax highlighting for source code snippets