ScratchPadIt: plain text notes for Mac

Plain text notes for Mac. Paste anything and the hidden formatting disappears. Open any text file on your Mac, fold what you are not reading, drop a table into a page, and have it all waiting on every Mac you own via iCloud.

Download on the Mac App Store
The App

Note taking that stays out of your way

Plain text notes that strip formatting on paste, reveal hidden Unicode characters, and sync across all your Macs via iCloud. Everything you need, nothing you do not.

The ScratchPadIt window on macOS, showing the page list in the sidebar and plain text with line numbers in the editor
Features

Built for the way you actually work

No formatting toolbars, no rich text, no bloat. Just fast, reliable plain text. Everything here is free.

📄

Multiple Pages

Keep as many separate pages as you need. Switch between them instantly from the sidebar. Add or delete pages in one click.

☁️

iCloud Sync

Your pages sync automatically across all your Macs via iCloud. Everything is always right where you left it, no setup required.

⚙️

Per Page Settings

Each page has its own settings for word wrap, delete protection, and invisible character detection. Customize one page without touching any other.

🔤

Font and Color Control

Choose your font, size, text color, and background color. Global preferences apply everywhere so the look stays consistent across all pages.

🔍

Invisible Character Detection

Reveal hidden Unicode characters with a visible marker. Find and remove zero width spaces, non breaking spaces, and other invisible characters before they cause problems.

↕️

Sort and Filter

Sort your pages by newest, oldest, alphabetically, or last modified. Filter by title to find any page instantly.

🔢

Line Numbers and Folding

Numbered lines down the side, and a fold arrow beside every bracket and brace. Collapse a whole level at once and the file stays folded when you come back to it.

📂

Open Any Text File

Open a file from anywhere on your Mac and read or edit it right here, or copy its contents into a page and keep it. Both are free.

Premium

More, for when a scratchpad is not quite enough

One purchase, no subscription. Everything above stays free and keeps working exactly as it does today.

✏️

Edit Files Where They Live

Open a file from anywhere on your Mac, or create a new one wherever you want it, and save your changes straight back to disk. No copying, no exporting, no second version to keep track of.

🧮

Tables in a Page

Insert a grid anywhere in a page. Drag the edges to size it, merge cells across rows and columns, and align the text inside them. It is stored as plain text, so it survives export and sync.

🪟

Up to Three Pages at Once

Put pages side by side to compare them, each scrolling on its own. Close any pane when you are done with it.

🔎

Find and Replace Everywhere

Regular expressions with capture groups, and search across every page at once instead of one at a time.

✨

Text Transformations

Format and minify JSON, encode and decode Base64 and URLs, change case, sort and deduplicate lines, count words, and hash a selection.

🗂️

Groups

Sort pages into folders in the sidebar, so a long list stops being a long list.

📤

Export

Write any page out to a file, wherever you want it.

Per page settings

Every page on its own terms

Different pages serve different purposes. A deployment checklist needs word wrap off. A draft email needs it on. A private page needs delete protection so nothing gets wiped by accident.

ScratchPadIt gives each page its own configuration so you never have to undo a global setting just because one page needs something different.

Word Wrap Delete Protection Show Invisibles Sort by Date Sort Alphabetically Line Numbers Code Folding
Word Wrap
Delete Protection
Show Invisibles
ScratchPadIt app icon

Ready to clear the clutter?

Download ScratchPadIt free from the Mac App Store. Premium is a one-time purchase inside the app.

Download on the Mac App Store