inotes

Your notes, your terminal.

A macOS CLI for Apple Notes — list, read, create, edit, delete, and search notes without leaving the command line. Built for humans and AI agents alike.

Requirements

• macOS 14+ (Sonoma or later)
• Automation permission for Notes.app (System Settings > Privacy & Security > Automation)

Install

Homebrew

brew install wangwalk/tap/inotes

From source

make build
# binary at ./bin/inotes

Or with SwiftPM directly:

swift build -c release

Quick start

inotes                    # show recent iCloud notes
inotes accounts           # list all accounts
inotes show all           # all iCloud notes
inotes folders            # list folders with note counts
inotes mkfolder Projects  # create a folder
inotes read 1             # read full note by index
inotes search "meeting"   # search by title or content

Commands

show — List notes

inotes                                # recent notes (default)
inotes today                          # notes modified today
inotes show week                      # notes modified this week
inotes show all                       # all notes
inotes show --folder Work             # notes in a specific folder
inotes show recent --limit 10         # limit results

Notes in the system “Recently Deleted” folder are excluded.

folders — List folders

inotes folders                        # all folders with note counts
inotes folders --json                 # JSON output

The system “Recently Deleted” folder is excluded.

mkfolder — Create a folder

inotes mkfolder Projects
inotes mkfolder Work --account Exchange
inotes mkfolder Ideas --json

accounts — List accounts

inotes accounts                       # list all accounts (iCloud, Exchange, IMAP, etc.)
inotes accounts --json                # JSON output

read — Read full note

inotes read 1                         # read by index
inotes read A3F2                      # read by ID prefix

add — Create a note

inotes add --title "Meeting Notes"
inotes add -t "Ideas" -b "Draft outline" -f Projects
inotes add --title "Shopping list" --body "Milk, bread, eggs"

When run interactively (without --no-input), missing title/body/folder will be prompted.

edit — Modify a note

inotes edit 1 --title "Updated Title"
inotes edit 2 --body "New content" --folder Projects
inotes edit 5 -t "Title" -b "Body" -f Work

delete — Delete a note

inotes delete 1                       # delete with confirmation
inotes delete 1 --force               # skip confirmation
inotes delete 2 --dry-run             # preview without deleting

search — Search notes

inotes search "quarterly review"
inotes search "TODO" --folder Work --limit 10

Notes in the system “Recently Deleted” folder are excluded.

status — Check permission

inotes status                         # check automation permission

inotes status --json

{
  "authorized" : true,
  "automationPermission" : "granted"
}

Multi-account support

By default, inotes only shows notes from your iCloud account. Use --account or --all-accounts to access other accounts.

# List available accounts
inotes accounts

# Filter by account name (case-insensitive substring match)
inotes show all --account Exchange
inotes show all -a gmail
inotes folders --account iCloud
inotes search "draft" -a Exchange

# Show notes from all accounts
inotes show all --all-accounts
inotes folders --all-accounts

The -a/--account option is accepted on all commands. It affects commands that fetch notes/folders (e.g. show, folders, read, add, edit, delete, search, mkfolder); for accounts and status it is currently ignored.

Note identification

Notes are identified by index or ID prefix:

• Index — a 1-based position from the most recent show output (e.g., 1, 2, 3).
• ID prefix — the first 4+ characters of a note's internal ID (e.g., A3F2).

Output formats

Flag	Short	Description
(default)		Human-readable table with indices
--json	-j	Machine-readable JSON
--plain		Tab-separated lines for scripting
--quiet	-q	Count only

JSON examples

inotes show --json

[
  {
    "body" : "Discussed Q1 plans",
    "creationDate" : "2026-02-08T10:00:00Z",
    "folder" : "Work",
    "id" : "x-coredata://AB12CD34-...",
    "modificationDate" : "2026-02-08T14:30:00Z",
    "title" : "Meeting Notes"
  }
]

inotes accounts --json

[
  {
    "id" : "x-coredata://0D80089A-.../ICAccount/p3",
    "name" : "iCloud"
  },
  {
    "id" : "x-coredata://76BBD5A1-.../EWSAccount/p3",
    "name" : "Exchange"
  }
]

Global options

These options are available on all commands:

Option	Short	Description
--account <name>	-a	Filter by account name
--all-accounts		Include notes from all accounts (default: iCloud only)
--json	-j	Emit machine-readable JSON output
--plain		Emit stable tab-separated output
--quiet	-q	Only emit count output
--no-color		Disable colored output
--no-input		Disable interactive prompts (for scripts and agents)
--version	-V	Print version
--help	-h	Print help

Permissions

inotes uses AppleScript (osascript) to communicate with Notes.app. On first run, macOS will prompt you to allow Automation access.

Privacy

inotes runs locally and does not send your notes to any server. It uses osascript to query Notes.app and prints results to stdout.

If you see "Permission denied" errors:

1. Open System Settings > Privacy & Security > Automation.
2. Find your terminal application (Terminal.app, iTerm, etc.).
3. Enable access to Notes.
4. Restart your terminal.
5. Run inotes status to verify.

Core library

The reusable Swift core lives in Sources/INotesCore and can be consumed as a library dependency:

// Package.swift
.package(url: "https://github.com/wangwalk/inotes.git", from: "0.1.1")

// target dependency
.product(name: "INotesCore", package: "inotes")

License

MIT