The one-minute mood journal
Deep mood analysis. One minute a day.
You spend the minute. Satoru finds the patterns. Try it right here.
Every word you write is encrypted on your device, before it's ever stored. Your words stay yours.
What a minute becomes.
One check-in is a dot. Twenty-eight are a shape. After a few weeks, Satoru starts pointing out what your days have in common, in plain words, never clinical labels.
Example, from the Insights tab
"Entries that mention being outdoors rate a full point higher than days without."
Track what matters to you. Mood, energy and sleep are just the defaults. Add a slider, a count, or a simple yes/no for whatever shapes your days, and Satoru folds it into the analysis.
"Ten minutes in, and this thing has me spilling my guts and reflecting in ways I never thought possible."Rachel · beta tester
Privacy
Encrypted on your device.
No ads, no trackers.
Your words never train AI.
Your phone does the encrypting, before a single word is saved. By default, we back up a copy of your key so a new phone can restore your journal; turn on self-managed keys and you hold the only copy. How that works
Built by a security consultant who audits other people's apps for a living, and wanted one journal that could pass his own inspection.
When you want more than a minute.
Some days a minute is plenty. Other days something is stuck. Guided journaling gives you a thread to pull, and the Guides sit on the other side of the page.
Think something through with Marcus Aurelius. He'll question you, not flatter you.
CBT Guide
The thought is not the truth. Let's test it.
Carl Jung
Make the unconscious conscious.
DBT Guide
Two things can be true at once.
ACT Guide
You don't have to believe every thought you think.
Pragmatic Buddhist
The gap before the reaction. That's where practice lives.
Shunryu Suzuki
Beginner's mind, always.
Ajahn Chah
Let go a little. Have a little peace.
Dogen
To study the self is to forget the self.
Lao Tzu
Yield, and remain whole.
Saint Francis
Start by doing what is necessary.
Seneca
We suffer more in imagination.
Marcus Aurelius
The obstacle is the way.
Epictetus
Some things are up to us. Start there.
Simone de Beauvoir
You are your choices.
Viktor Frankl
Meaning is found, not given.
Albert Camus
One must imagine oneself content.
Your own guide
Build a voice that fits the way you think.
Why not just journal into an AI chatbot?
Fair question. A lot of people already journal into a chatbot at midnight. Here's the difference.
Satoru
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Structure, every dayMood, energy, sleep, your own trackers. One minute, the same shape each time.
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A year of patternsComparable days become charts, arcs, and plain-language insights.
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Private by defaultYour phone encrypts every entry before it's stored, and an optional self-managed mode leaves the only key with you. Nothing trains any model.
A chatbot tab
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A blank box, every timeYou start from zero and a blinking cursor, again.
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A chat scrollLast March is somewhere up there. Good luck.
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Someone else's serversChats with a general-purpose bot live on the provider's servers, under the provider's policies. Your Satoru journal never leaves your phone unencrypted.
Your most honest thoughts deserve a place of their own.
"I used to dump everything into a chatbot at midnight. This feels built for exactly that, except it's actually mine."[PLACEHOLDER] Beta tester, Android
Always free. Premium when you want to go deeper.
The free tier is the real app, not a timed trial.
Free
$0, for as long as you like
- Daily check-ins and your full journal
- All fourteen themes
- Reflect with a guide from each tradition
- Silent meditation timer and Box Breathing
- Apple Watch and Health sync
Premium
$9.99/month, or $99.99/year
- Deep mood-pattern analysis
- All eighteen guides, ten times the conversations
- Voice for every guide, replies read aloud
- Guided meditation and the full breathing library
For scale: AI journaling apps elsewhere run $15 to $20 a month.
The subscription is the business model, not your data.
The day's passage
The day's passage · One arrives with each morning's check-in
Such as are thy habitual thoughts, such also will be the character of thy mind; for the soul is dyed by the thoughts.
Five passages in all; the arrow turns the page.
A note from the maker
I have been a Buddhist practitioner for 17 years. The practice of honest self-examination is something I take seriously, and I believe it deserves a space that takes your privacy just as seriously.
I've also spent my career in application security. Companies hire me to find the weak spots in their software before someone else does. After years of seeing how apps really handle your data behind the scenes, I wanted to build a journaling tool I'd actually trust with my own thoughts. The honest ones, at 3am, about the things that actually keep me up.
Satoru is what I couldn't find anywhere else. I hope it becomes that for you too.
Dave
Creator of Satoru · Buddhist Practitioner · Application Security ConsultantQuick questions, quicker answers.
Is Satoru therapy?
No. Satoru is a journaling and reflection tool. It never diagnoses, and it is not a substitute for professional care.
Who can read my journal?
Everything you write is encrypted on your device with a per-user, hardware-wrapped key. By default, a recovery copy of that key sits with us so a new phone can restore your journal. Turn on self-managed keys and you hold the only copy, unrecoverable by anyone if you lose it.
Is my writing used to train AI?
Never. When you choose to talk to a Guide or run an analysis, only that conversation is decrypted on your device and sent securely for processing. The response is stored back inside your encrypted journal, and none of it is ever used to train any AI model.
Why not just journal into an AI chatbot?
Three reasons. Structure: a chatbot gives you a blank box, Satoru gives every day the same one-minute shape, so weeks become comparable. History: a year in Satoru is charts and patterns, a year in a chatbot is a scroll. Privacy: chats with a general-purpose bot live on the provider's servers under the provider's policies, while what you write in Satoru is encrypted on your device before it's stored.
What's free?
Daily check-ins and your full journal, all fourteen themes, reflecting with a guide from each tradition, the silent meditation timer, and Box Breathing. Premium adds all eighteen guides, the full breathing library, deep pattern analysis, far more guide conversations, replies read aloud for every guide, and the guided meditation library.
How do I cancel?
Through your app store, in two taps. Apple or Google handles the rest.
iPhone and Android?
Both, plus an Apple Watch app for check-ins, the meditation timer, and breathing from the wrist. Apple Health and Health Connect sync can fold sleep, activity, and heart data into your insights.