Apple Journal or a Goal Journal? When Each One Makes Sense

What is the Journal app on iPhone?

Journal is Apple’s own journaling app. It arrived with iOS 17.2 in December 2023, according to Apple’s launch announcement (opens in a new tab).

It costs nothing.

An entry can hold words, photos, video, audio and places, and the app can show moments from your day to write about.

What it does now

It does more today than the first version did. Apple’s guide to writing in your journal (opens in a new tab) now covers more than one journal per person.

There’s also a calendar for finding an old entry, handy for that Thursday in March when something happened and you wrote it down but can’t remember a single detail.

Odd how often that happens.

Newer iPhones with Apple Intelligence also get writing prompts based on what you’ve typed so far. For every way to write on a phone, start with how to journal on your iPhone.

What Apple Journal does well

Let’s be fair first. It does a lot.

• Long, rich entries. Text, photos, video, audio recordings and drawings, all in one entry.
• Ideas from your day: Journaling Suggestions turn recent photos, places, workouts and songs into moments.
• A lock: Face ID or your passcode keeps the journal to you.
• More screens: with Journal turned on in iCloud, entries also show up on your iPad and Mac.
• A reminder: a writing schedule, plus a widget for the Lock Screen.

Apple’s page on building a habit with Journal (opens in a new tab) covers the schedule and the widget. It also shows an Insights view that tracks the days you write.

The suggestions are made on your phone. Apple’s Journaling Suggestions privacy page (opens in a new tab) says you choose which kinds of data feed them, and which moments go into an entry.

For long entries with photos, the built-in app is enough.

If that’s what you’re after, feel free to stop reading here, with our blessing. The suggestions get their own guide: what Journaling Suggestions on iPhone are.

Why people stop opening it

Some people keep a built-in journal for years. Others drift away by February.

Both are normal, and we haven’t measured why. These are guesses, so check them against your own January.

1. The page asks for a lot. A big, empty entry with room for photos can feel like homework on a tired night.
2. Nothing happened today. Suggestions need a photo or a walk, and some days have neither, just laundry on a chair.
3. No reason beyond writing. If writing about the day isn’t what you want, nothing else pulls you back.

The third one is probably the big one, because a journal that only asks about the day has nothing to offer on a day that offered nothing.

And it’s where a goal journal works differently.

A blank page needs something to write about first.

Apple Journal vs a small-steps goal journal

The difference is what comes first. Apple’s app starts with your day and asks you to write about it.

A goal journal starts with one thing you want and a step small enough for today. The line comes after.

Different jobs, then.

In a goal journal, the day’s job is already decided. Do the small step and tap Mark done. Then tap Say how it went and write one line while it’s fresh.

That decided step is the whole difference.

A blank page waits for something to say. A task hands you one, which helps on a night when your brain has already gone to bed and only your thumbs are still awake.

But the trade-off is real. Yumemira won’t hold holiday photos in a long entry, and it won’t follow anyone to a Mac. If that matters more, Apple’s app is the better fit.

Can you use both journals together?

Yes, and it’s a sensible split. Let each app do the one job it’s good at.

Keep long entries in Apple’s app, for trips and the days you want in detail. Keep the daily step in a goal journal, where one line will do.

Here’s what we don’t do. Yumemira is iPhone only.

The journal stays on that one iPhone and doesn’t show up on other devices. So use Settings › Backup to save a file you keep, somewhere that isn’t the same phone. And Free gives you one goal at a time.

Still deciding between a notebook and a phone? Paper vs digital journal compares them by the reasons people stop.

The trick works in any app, Apple’s included. It’s how Yumemira, the small-steps goal journal for iPhone is built, and it works on paper too.

Which one should you open tonight?

Pick by the job you want done, then try it for a week. Seven nights is enough to know.

• Apple’s app, if you want long entries with photos, or your journal on a Mac.
• A goal journal, if you want a small daily step and a line about it.
• Both, if the big days deserve detail and the small steps deserve a line.

As far as we can tell, the best journal is simply the one that gets opened on a tired night, when the light is off and the phone is already in your hand.

For more options, see the best journal app for iPhone.

Pick the app you’d open half asleep.

So if a goal and a step sound like the missing piece, try it in Yumemira. Its phone journal keeps a question waiting. A list on the fridge works too.

Two entries in January was a start. Tonight’s line makes it three.