OpenStickies
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Works with OpenCode: see your agent’s plan on a sticky

Sticky notes, rebuilt for the Windows desktop.

Every note is its own small floating window, like classic Stickies — now with rich formatting, pictures, smart checklists, tags, workspaces, version history and private notes.

Download for Windows View on GitHub

Free & open source Windows 10 & 11 MIT license

OpenStickies on the desktop: a meeting note with formatted text, a “Launch week” checklist with due dates and a 3/8 progress count, a hiking note with a picture, a daily-habits checklist, a rolled-up groceries note and an OpenCode task note working on step 3 of 7.

Features

Everything a sticky note should do — and plenty it never could.

OpenStickies keeps the classic idea of small notes floating on your desktop, and rebuilds everything inside them.

  • Rich formatting

    Headings, colors, highlights, tables, code and a “/” command menu.

  • Smart checklists

    Nested items that stay in sync, due dates and a progress count.

  • Searchable snips

    Snip the screen into a note; the words in pictures become searchable.

  • Workspaces

    Save note layouts as “Work” or “Home” and switch in a keystroke.

  • Version history

    See word-by-word changes and restore any earlier version.

  • Private notes

    Encrypted on disk with AES-256-GCM, unlocked by your password.

Writing

Write the way you think.

Format as you type with Markdown-style shortcuts, or type / to insert a heading, checklist, table, image, screen snip, date, link, reminder or template.

  • Bold, italic, underline, strikethrough, superscript and subscript, titles and headings, quotes and code blocks.
  • 9 text colors, 6 highlights, 5 sizes, alignment, links, tables and dividers.
  • Type #  for a heading, -  for bullets or []  for a checklist, and **bold** or ==highlight== inline.
  • By default the formatting toolbar pops up over the bottom edge when you select text, so a note never changes size.
  • Six built-in templates, from meeting notes to a packing list, that fill in the date for you.
A meeting note with headings, highlights, colored text and the formatting toolbar along its bottom edge, next to a note where typing “/” has opened the command menu: Title, Heading, Subheading, Normal text, Checklist, Bulleted list, Numbered list and Quote.

Checklists

Checklists that keep themselves in order.

Nest items with Tab, and parents and sub-items stay in sync. A progress count like 3/8 shows in the title bar.

  • Ticking a parent ticks everything under it, and once every sub-item is ticked, the parent ticks itself.
  • Add @today, @fri, @nextweek, @+3d or @10/20 for a due date. Overdue items turn red.
  • Move items with Alt+Shift+↑/↓, or drag the grip on their left.
  • Make a checklist untick itself every day or every Monday, for routines and habits.
  • Ticked items stay where they are, or move to the bottom if you prefer.
Three checklist notes: “Launch week” with nested items, due dates such as @tomorrow and @fri, an overdue date in red and a 3/8 count in the title bar; “Daily habits”, which unticks every day; and a “Stand-up” list.

Pictures & snips

Pictures go exactly where you want them.

Paste, drag in or snip the screen, then lay pictures out the way you would in Word.

  • Snip the screen from anywhere with Ctrl+Alt+X, or type /snip in a note.
  • Resize from any corner, and set a picture in line with text, wrapped left or right, top and bottom, behind or in front of text.
  • Drag pictures around; the arrow keys nudge floating ones.
  • Windows’ built-in text recognition reads snips, screenshots and photos, so the notes list finds them by their words.
  • Right-click a picture to copy its text.
A hiking note with a picture wrapped in its text above a checklist, next to a note with a snipped bar chart selected, showing its resize handles and the picture layout bar.

Organize

Tag it, link it, find it.

Type #project to tag a note and [[ to link to another. Open the notes list with Ctrl+H to search all of them.

  • # suggests tags you’ve already used. Ctrl+Click a tag to list every note that has it.
  • Link to a note by title, or create a new one, and see what points back under Linked from.
  • A sidebar with All, On desktop, Kept on top, Reminders, Tasks and Trash, plus your saved searches, tags and workspaces.
  • Workspaces remember which notes are open, where and how big. Switch with Ctrl+Alt+W, or let OpenStickies switch when you dock or change monitors.
The Notes list searching for #work, with a sidebar of views, saved searches and tags, and previews of the matching notes.

A small search language

Type a filter into the notes list, then click Save this search to keep it in the sidebar.

A tag
#work
Unfinished checklists
has:unchecked
Notes with pictures
has:image
Recent edits
edited:today edited:week edited:3d
Due dates
due:today due:week due:overdue
On the desktop / kept on top
is:open is:pinned
By color
color:blue
An exact phrase
"call back"

Tasks

Every to-do from every note, in one list.

The Tasks view gathers every unticked checklist item from all your notes, grouped by note or by due date.

  • Tick items right there and the note updates, even if it’s closed.
  • Click an item to jump straight to it.
  • Due dates come from the @fri or @10/20 you type in a checklist.
  • Search the notes list with due:today, due:week or due:overdue.
The Tasks view grouped by date (overdue, tomorrow, next 7 days and no date), with each item showing the note it comes from.

Version history

Changed your mind? Go back.

OpenStickies keeps a snapshot whenever you come back to a note after a few minutes away, and shows exactly what changed, word by word.

  • Open ⋯ → Version history… for a timeline of a note’s versions.
  • Preview any old version with its changes highlighted.
  • Restore any version. Your current text stays in the history, so a restore can be undone.
  • Deleted a note by mistake? The Trash keeps it for 30 days.
The Version history window for a note: a timeline of versions on the left, and the Changes view with added and removed words highlighted.

Private notes

Lock away the notes that are just for you.

Set a password in Settings, then choose ⋯ → Make private… on any note. Its words and pictures are encrypted on disk.

  • AES-256-GCM encryption, with the key protected by your password via scrypt.
  • While locked, private notes are hidden from search, previews and exports.
  • They lock after a set idle time, and whenever Windows locks or sleeps.
  • Windows Hello can unlock them if it’s set up on the PC.

If you forget the password, private notes can’t be recovered.

A locked private note asking for its password, next to the Private notes settings: lock automatically after 5 minutes, and unlock with Windows Hello.

Dark mode

Easy on the eyes, day or night.

Choose System, Light or Dark in Settings. System follows Windows, and every note color has its own dark version.

  • Yellow
  • Orange
  • Pink
  • Purple
  • Blue
  • Teal
  • Green
  • Gray
  • Charcoal
  • Nine note colors, each with a light and a dark version.
  • Settings also picks the color and font for new notes, and the text size for all of them.
Four notes in the dark theme, in purple, yellow, charcoal and pink.

OpenCode integration

Watch your AI agent’s plan on a sticky.

While OpenCode works on a multi-step task, a sticky on your desktop shows its plan.

  • The steps it has finished are ticked, and the step it’s on is marked ▶.
  • The steps still to do stay open, so you can see where it’s going.
  • Sub-agents’ lists appear as sections of the same note.
  • A status line says Working on step 3 of 7, Waiting for you, All 7 steps done or Stopped with an error.
  1. In OpenStickies, open Settings → OpenCode → Connect. This adds a small plugin to ~/.config/opencode/plugins/.
  2. Restart OpenCode.
An OpenCode task note, “Add dark mode to the storefront”, working on step 3 of 7: finished steps ticked, the current step marked ▶ and a sub-agent’s section below. Next to it, a “Deploy steps” checklist sticky.

Notes on request

The plugin also gives the agent four tools, so you can just ask: “put the deploy steps on a sticky” or “make me a checklist sticky for this refactor and tick items off as you go.”

The agent’s OpenStickies tools
ToolWhat it does
stickies_createNew sticky with a title and Markdown content (- [ ] makes a checkbox), optional color and tags
stickies_updateReplace the content, append to it, rename it or change its color
stickies_checkTick or untick a checklist item by its text or number
stickies_listList the stickies the agent has made (with ids), e.g. to continue one from an earlier session

Your notes stay yours

The agent can only change stickies it created. It can’t read, change or tick your own notes, and a sticky you delete can’t be edited back.

Every multi-part task gets a sticky

Requests with two or more distinct subtasks get a to-do list first. Quick questions don’t create a note. Task notes are blue, locked so your typing can’t clash with the agent, and tagged #opencode plus the project name.

Local, and scriptable

It runs over a small API on 127.0.0.1 with a random port and token; requests from web pages are refused. Scripts can use it too — see the README.

Safety & privacy

Your notes are safe, and they stay on your computer.

No account to sign up for. Your notes live in %APPDATA%\OpenStickies\data\, with several layers of protection against slips, crashes and prying eyes.

  • Stored locally

    Notes, pictures, templates and settings are saved as files on your PC. Everything stays on your computer.

  • Version history

    A snapshot whenever you return to a note after a few minutes away. Restore any version, and undo a restore.

  • Trash for 30 days

    Deleted notes wait in the Trash for 30 days before they’re gone.

  • Daily backups

    Daily copies of your notes cover the last 14 days.

  • Crash-safe saves

    Saves are written atomically and flushed to disk, so a crash won’t leave a half-written file.

  • Backup & restore

    One file with every note, image and template. Private notes stay encrypted inside it.

  • Encrypted private notes

    AES-256-GCM, with the key protected by your password via scrypt.

  • Sandboxed windows

    Context isolation, a strict Content-Security-Policy and an allowlist sanitizer for anything pasted or imported.

Keyboard shortcuts

Keep your hands on the keyboard.

Global shortcuts work anywhere in Windows, and you can change them in Settings.

Anywhere in Windows

Global shortcuts
Ctrl+Alt+NNew note
Ctrl+Alt+XSnip the screen into a note
Ctrl+Alt+SBring all notes to the front
Ctrl+Alt+HShow / hide all notes
Ctrl+Alt+WNext workspace

As you type

Typing shortcuts
#  ##  ### Headings
-  1. Bulleted / numbered list
[] Checklist item
> Quote
``` --- then EnterCode block / divider
**bold** *italic* ~~strike~~Bold / italic / strikethrough
`code` ==highlight==Inline code / highlight
/Command menu
#project [[Tag / link to a note
@fri @+3dDue date on a checklist item

In a note

Shortcuts in a note
Ctrl+N / Ctrl+W / Ctrl+DNew / close / delete note
Ctrl+HNotes list
Ctrl+B / I / U / T / EBold / italic / underline / strikethrough / inline code
Ctrl+Shift+L / O / CBulleted / numbered list / checklist
Ctrl+Alt+1 / 2 / 3 / 0Title / heading / subheading / normal text
Tab / Shift+TabIndent / outdent (list items, table cells)
Alt+Shift+↑ / ↓Move a list item
Ctrl+KLink
Ctrl+FFind in note
Ctrl+Shift+HEdit HTML source
Ctrl+Shift+VPaste as plain text
Ctrl+Shift+PKeep on top
Ctrl+Shift+RRoll up / unroll (or double-click the title bar)
Ctrl+= / Ctrl+- / Ctrl+0Zoom in / out / reset
Ctrl+PPrint
Ctrl+ClickOpen a link, linked note or #tag

Get OpenStickies for Windows

Free for Windows 10 and 11. Choose the installer, or the portable version if you’d rather not install anything.

Installer

Recommended

Installs OpenStickies and adds Start menu and desktop shortcuts.

OpenStickies-Setup-<version>.exe

Download installer

Portable

Runs without installing anything. Download it and double-click.

OpenStickies-Portable-<version>.exe

Download portable

Seeing “Windows protected your PC”? The builds aren’t code-signed, so Windows SmartScreen may warn you the first time. Click More info → Run anyway.

Build from source

Needs Node.js 20 or newer. npm run dist builds the installer and portable app into dist/.

All releases on GitHub

Terminal 
git clone https://github.com/ItsCetla/OpenStickies.git
cd OpenStickies
npm install
npm start

FAQ

Questions, answered.

Windows says “Windows protected your PC”. Is that normal?

Yes. The builds aren’t code-signed, so Windows SmartScreen may show that warning the first time you run OpenStickies. Click More info → Run anyway.

Where are my notes stored?

Everything stays on your computer, in %APPDATA%\OpenStickies\data\: your notes in notes.json, pictures in attachments\, version history in history\ and daily backups in backups\. Settings → Open data folder takes you there.

One catch: if OpenStickies is started by a packaged Windows app (for example from a terminal inside Claude Desktop), Windows redirects that copy’s data to the app’s private folder, so it has its own separate notes.

I used Stickies before. Where did my notes go?

OpenStickies used to be called Stickies. The first time OpenStickies starts, it copies everything from %APPDATA%\Stickies\data\ into its own folder: notes, pictures, version history, settings, templates and private notes. The installer also replaces the old Stickies install, so you won’t have both.

The old folder stays where it was as a backup. Once you’ve checked your notes are all there, you can delete it.

Do I need an account or an internet connection?

No account. Your notes are saved on your computer, not in the cloud. The OpenCode integration is local too: it talks to OpenStickies over a small API on 127.0.0.1, and requests from web pages are refused.

How do I back up my notes, or move them to another PC?

Open Settings → Back up all notes… to save one file with every note, image and template (private notes stay encrypted). On the other PC, use Restore from backup…, which adds the backup’s notes alongside your current ones.

OpenStickies also keeps daily copies of your notes for the last 14 days, and the Trash keeps deleted notes for 30 days.

I closed every note. Where did OpenStickies go?

It keeps running in the system tray. Windows hides new tray icons behind the ^ arrow at the right end of the taskbar; drag the yellow icon onto the taskbar to keep it in view. Click it to bring your notes back, or right-click it for more.

You can also press Ctrl+Alt+H to show or hide all notes, or Ctrl+Alt+N for a new one.

I forgot my private-notes password. Can I get my notes back?

No. Private notes are encrypted with a key that only your password can unlock, so if you forget the password, they can’t be recovered. Your other notes aren’t affected.

Is there a Mac or Linux version?

No. OpenStickies is made for Windows 10 and 11, and the releases are Windows builds.