I made note-taking a habit a couple of years ago, and I'm still learning how to take notes like a pro. I look for features that are meaningful and fit my workflow instead of trying to mimic someone else's slick note-taking setup.

It hasn't always been the case. When I started using note-taking apps, my YouTube feed was full of productivity videos about note-taking tools and their "genius" features. That's how I learned about Notion, and I installed it immediately on my PC.

The first few days were interesting, as I learned a lot about how Notion databases work. I regret spending too much time on this because it caused a mental shift where I started to overcomplicate my thinking.

This is when I regretted switching to Notion and decided to leave. But instead of choosing proprietary software, I picked a self-hosted, open source app called Trilium. It changed my digital note-organization habits.

Trilium challenges Notion's style of organizing notes

The hype around Notion databases is real, and they deserve attention for how powerful they are. You can build a system without a database, but it won't be as powerful as one with a database, which is where Notion's powerful features live.

Databases are powerful. They make your notes compact, which is possible because of how they work in Notion. Every item inside a database is a full Notion page, so you can add as much information as you want while still keeping it clean.

Trilium can also keep it clean and compact, but it uses a different strategy. It keeps your notes organized by allowing you to create a hierarchical tree of notes, which you can access from the left sidebar.

In Trilium, each note can have sub-notes nested under it. You can go as deep as you want, and you can scan them from the left sidebar.

For anyone new to taking notes on a device, a hierarchical tree of notes feels more natural because we've used this mental model since childhood.

When I first tried Trilium, it instantly felt familiar, and I never felt the need to learn something new to keep my notes organized. You don't need to do anything fancy: just decide which one is a parent and which one is a child.

I take notes only for myself, so why would I need to learn a complicated setup like Notion when I don't get any tangible benefits from it?

Trilium changed my note organization habits for good

I stopped obsessing over note structure

Notion supports nesting, but it's one of many features. In Trilium, the hierarchical tree is the primary structure, and you are only a click away from creating a child note.

After coming back to Notion, everything felt more complicated than it should be. Switching to Trilium made me realize I spent more time building the structure than writing notes.

I prefer building a knowledge tree with real notes over designing a complicated system.

Why did I choose to self-host Trilium?

Self-hosting means running software on your hardware or rented servers, giving you complete control over your data. However, I haven't self-hosted Trilium for this reason alone.

Trilium is limited to desktops, and in a mobile-first world, that's a huge dealbreaker for many. The only way to fix this is self-hosting the tool on your hardware.

After you complete the setup process, you can access Trilium notes from your phone's web browser. It's not limited to phones; you can access it from any device that can run a web browser.

While self-hosting isn't for everyone, given all its complexities, installing Trilium on my hardware didn't feel difficult at all. It was the easiest self-hosting experience I've ever had.

I have Docker installed on my PC, and I copy-pasted everything mentioned on Trilium's server installation docs page in Windows PowerShell, and it worked.

If you have a NAS, that's even better than setting it up on your PC because the former gives you an always-on setup.

However, self-hosting can't replace a full-fledged mobile experience. The developers know this, and I'm glad an official Trilium app is in the works for Android and iOS. I can't wait to try it on my Android phone and iPhone.

I won't switch back to using Notion as my primary note-taking tool

I have no plans to quit using Notion unless something goes terribly wrong and it shuts shop. However, I'm not its daily user, either.

I'll keep using it as a lover of productivity apps. However, for taking real notes, I'm betting on Trilium.

https://www.androidpolice.com/leaving-notion-for-self-hosted-open-source-app-changed-my-digital-note-organization-habits/