# PenCake: Minimal Writing App

> Private journal, diary & notes

Canonical page: [https://chrome-stats.com/d/id1382218014](https://chrome-stats.com/d/id1382218014)

## Overview

- **ID:** `id1382218014`
- **Platform:** Apple
- **Type:** Apple app
- **Status:** Available
- **Publisher:** Diffathy, Inc.
- **Category:** Lifestyle
- **Rating:** 4.30 / 5 (118 ratings)
- **Version:** 3.17
- **Last updated:** 2026-07-16
- **First published:** 2018-05-24
- **Size:** 102 MB
- **Data as of:** 2026-09-20
- **Store listing:** [Apple App Store](https://apps.apple.com/us/app/pencake-minimal-writing-app/id1382218014)
- **Website:** [https://pencake.app/](https://pencake.app/)
- **Privacy policy:** [https://pencakeapp.github.io/info/privacy.html](https://pencakeapp.github.io/info/privacy.html)

## Description

PenCake provides a beautifully minimal space for your thoughts—designed for notes, journaling, or stories. It focuses on your words with no clutter, elegant typography, and a writing experience that feels natural.

Since 2018, over 2.3 million writers have chosen PenCake for peaceful writing. Key features include Markdown support, auto-save, version history, image insertion, word/character counts, and cross-device sync, with Face ID/Touch ID protection and a premium tier for themes and fonts.

## Rankings

- #130,990 — Overall
- #43 — writing tool
- #57 — writing tools

## Review summary

Users love PenCake for its simple, elegant design and writing-focused flow, plus reliable cross-device syncing and a valuable one-time premium option. Recurrent drawbacks center on accessibility and feature gating: dark mode is premium-only, free tier is restricted, formatting is limited (no bold/italics), backups/auto-save can be unreliable, and search capabilities are lacking. Overall, it’s praised for aesthetics and writing ease but callers want more formatting, better free features, and stronger safety guarantees.

### Pros

- Simple, elegant, minimalist design that emphasizes writing.
- Intuitive navigation and organization (easy to swipe between notes; writing flow remains smooth).
- Cross-device cloud syncing across iOS and Android (manual sync on free tier, automatic sync on paid).
- One-time lifetime premium license offers good value (no ongoing subscription).
- Writing-focused environment with font size adjustments and basic formatting support (suitable for poetry and prose).

### Cons

- Dark Mode/accessibility is behind a premium paywall, hindering visually impaired users or night-time writing.
- Free tier is heavily restricted or perceived as gated, limiting features unless upgrading.
- Lack of rich text formatting (no bold/italics; limited headings/indents) and other advanced formatting options.
- Auto-save/backup reliability concerns and potential data loss in some scenarios.
- Search functionality needs improvement (find/replace and better overall search).

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Source: [Chrome-Stats](https://chrome-stats.com/d/id1382218014)