I've been journaling for 12 years: Here's what's missing from Pixel Journal

I’m closing in on 10,000 journal entries since I started way back in 2014. I’ve been a dedicated Day One user that entire time, but every once in a while, I see a new journal app that makes me think about switching. Last year, Google released its very own journal app, and I have to say, as a huge fan of modern Android design — and more specifically, Material 3 Expressive — Google’s Journal app immediately caught my eye.

I have to get this out of the way right at the start: I haven’t found anywhere that explicitly confirms that Pixel Journal uses end-to-end encryption. Google only states that, although the data you enter into Journal is processed on your device, if you choose to back it up to your Google account, “Google uses world-class security to protect the entries you back up or share.” Day One, on the other hand, makes it loud and clear that end-to-end encryption is enabled by default. My journal would probably be super boring to anyone else, but I still want it to be a safe space for my thoughts, and that absolutely means end-to-end encryption is a must-have for me. That said, Google’s app still has some fun features and design touches that I really like, so if that encryption caveat isn’t an issue for you, it’s worth taking a look. Let’s dive in.

A visually pleasant place to be

Pixel Journal has a number of features that I wish I had in Day One. Of these, most noticeable is Google’s use of Material Design standards in its app. This app feels smooth and modern in a way that Day One does not. Although Day One has improved a lot on this front since it initially came to Android, I still see lag when doing relatively simple things in the app. Just try tapping the journal switcher button; you’ll notice it takes a moment before the drawer slides up from the bottom of the screen. Maybe it’s due to its simplicity, but I don’t see this when perusing around in Pixel Journal.

I also like that Material You theming is incorporated in Journal, making the UI match the color you’ve chosen in your device’s theme settings. While Day One does allow you to choose the color of your journal from a pre-selected list of color options, Material theming is a central design feature of Android these days, and I love that Google uses it in Journal. Like the rest of my Pixel UI, my journal is green right now; it’s March, so I chose St. Patrick’s Day colors for this month’s Material You theme, and that’s auto-applied to my journal, too. Ideally, I’d go one step further if I were Google and allow Material theming as an option, in addition to selecting a color manually — almost a combination of what these two apps offer.

To put it simply: if I were building a brand new journal app for Android right now, it would look more like Pixel Journal and less like Day One. Day One seems to be trying, though, with some of its newer features incorporating newer Android components, but its timeline view, for example — which is the main view that people see and interact with most frequently — looks stale and dated. I should also mention one of my biggest pet peeves about Day One: it uses a font across the entire app that I believe was used more in older versions of Android, and it’s just plain ugly to me. It doesn’t look good in the modern world of Android, and typography in a writing app is of utmost importance. Day One on iOS has a whole list of fonts to choose from, but the Android version has been stuck with this one font since its inception. Pixel Journal at least uses a more modern font and allows you to choose between serif and sans serif, although once again, I’d prefer even more options than either app has.

I’m also intrigued by Google’s use of AI in its app, which is primarily used in two ways. I’ll be the first to call myself wary of inviting AI into my most private digital space, but so long as everything is processed on device, as Google claims, then I think there could be some really useful applications here. In Google’s app, AI is used to generate new journaling prompts based on your past entries. Google calls this “Past Topics,” and it can be a good way to reflect and dive deeper into things you wrote previously. Conversely, Day One provides a static pack of writing prompts (although this may be changing soon, according to a post from Day One’s founder).

Google also uses AI for its “Reflection” feature, which essentially generates a response at the bottom of your entry based on what you wrote, seemingly designed to be encouraging every time. This feature hasn’t been of much use for me, but I could see how a better-designed version of this might be useful. Most importantly to me, none of these AI-powered features are too in your face, and you can disable them entirely if you so choose.

After all these years of writing in Day One, I’ve long wished for more ways to interact with my data. Day One has some bare-bones statistics — how many entries you’ve written, how many photos and videos you’ve added to entries, how many days you’ve written, etc. — but that’s pretty much the extent of what it offers. Pixel Journal ups the ante ever-so-slightly with its Insights tab. My favorite feature here is the mood calendar, which presents a bird’s-eye view of the mood you’ve set for each day, represented by an emoji that you select when writing an entry. You’re also presented with other data, like what topic you journal about the most (which is manually selected on an entry-by-entry basis), the time of day you write most frequently, the longest word count, and how many entries you’ve written total. Like I said, this is only a step above what Day One offers, but I prefer the way it’s presented visually compared to Day One. Both could improve overall in the insights department.

Pixel Journal honestly isn’t a bad start from Google. From a distance, the app looks beautiful, too. Once you dive in, however, you’ll quickly find how half-baked it feels. Compared to a more established app — I’m looking at you, Day One — Google’s app simply does not compete on useful features.

Avoiding the Google Graveyard

Being a more mature product, Day One comes with perks that I consider vital. First and foremost, Day One is fully cross-platform. What started out as an Apple device-only app is now available on every major platform (Android, MacOS, iOS, Windows, and web). I tend to favor apps that I can access from anywhere because that leaves me the freedom to switch to devices in any of these ecosystems. Pixel Journal is Android-only so far, and restricted to some Pixel models, too, not even giving you the option to write in a web app (which does seem odd given Google’s Docs and Keep apps). Maybe Google is banking on Android’s new desktop mode, but that’s not gonna cut it for me.

While I do prefer Pixel Journal’s more modern-looking design, Day One is simply a more fully featured app, most likely thanks to its years-long head start. If I switched away today, I would sorely miss Day One’s in-line photos. Google separates photos from the text entry field, while Day One allows you to add photos right there where you’re writing. This is more intuitive to me, but you’d be surprised how many journaling apps don’t offer in-line media support.

Additionally, Day One offers a handful of features that simply don’t exist in Pixel Journal, such as creating multiple journals and a map view that shows pins on a map for every entry that has a location attached to it. Perhaps most importantly, Day One includes robust export options to make your journaling data truly portable. If I really wanted to, I could export all of my entries in a variety of different formats and stop using Day One altogether. Google does not provide any export options.

I won’t be ditching Day One anytime soon, and that’s not just because I have zero desire to transfer my thousands of entries to a new app. Day One has proven its longevity. For all I know, Pixel Journal will end up in the Google Graveyard — we’ve already stopped hearing about it since Google made a whole fuss about it during the Pixel 10’s launch. By comparison, Day One’s proven track record matters even more in the world of journaling. That said, I think the world would be a better place if more of us journaled, so whatever app you choose, just start writing!