Your tasks. Your files. Your rules.
Local-first task management for people who'd rather own a folder of Markdown files than trust another cloud subscription with their daily workflow.
Three Pillars
Own Your Data
Plain Markdown files with YAML frontmatter, stored on your filesystem. No cloud, no account, no subscription. Migrate by copying a folder.
Trustworthy Recurrence
Every recurring instance tracked individually. Miss one and it surfaces as overdue — not silently regenerated or dropped from the chain.
Focused Planning
Tasks grouped by date — Past, Now, Upcoming, Wrapped. No priority matrices, no Eisenhower quadrants. Just what's due and what isn't.
Built Different
Tasks are Markdown files
Each task is a `.md` file with YAML frontmatter. Open it in any editor, grep it from a terminal, or version it with git.
Sync with tools you control
Bring your own sync — Syncthing, rsync, git, or a USB drive. Daylight reads and writes files in a folder you manage.
No account required
Install, point at a folder, start working. No email, no password, no "we'll never share your data" promise to evaluate.
How It Works
From file to done in four steps. No setup wizards, no onboarding flows.
Create Tasks
Write a Markdown file or use the app UI — both produce the same result
Organize
Add tags, projects, scheduled dates, and recurrence rules via frontmatter
Sync
Syncthing propagates changes across devices — peer-to-peer, no server
Complete
Check it off, log time, and move on. Completed tasks archive cleanly
Honest Tradeoffs
"What about sync conflicts?"
Visible conflicts beat hidden data loss. When two devices edit the same task, Syncthing preserves both versions as conflict files. You choose the winner, not an algorithm.
"No built-in timers?"
Manual time entries capture what actually happened, not what a forgotten timer recorded. Log after the fact with 15-minute snapping — more honest, less overhead.
"Read-only calendar overlays?"
Calendar events provide planning context, not another inbox. Daylight shows your schedule alongside tasks without the complexity of two-way calendar sync.