Distraction Free Writing Mac

• Distraction Free Writing Mac Software
• Distraction Free Writing Software

It is distraction-free markdown editor by design. It can export to HTML, Word, ODT, PDF, Epub, and more. One nice feature is that it will convert headings to chapters if you export to Epub. It also provides different light and dark themes to help you get comfortable writing or editing. Ghostwriter is licensed under GPL v3. 8 Best Distraction-Free Writing App for Mac. Turn Any Webpage into Real Mac App – Fluidium. 9 Best 3D Modeling Software for Mac. Rudra Dec 31, 2020 0.

Distraction Free Writing Mac Software

In the digital age, basically everyone is a writer of some description – whether it’s social media content, company blogs, business proposals or something a little more traditional like news stories or screenplays.

Businesses and individuals of all kinds are writing more content than ever.

The biggest challenge for today’s writers is getting everything done in the most productive way. Demands are high and deadlines are short in the modern age, which means there’s no space for unwanted distractions getting in the way of your workflow.

In this article, we’re looking at the 10 best distraction-free writing apps that will help you produce a higher volume without compromising on quality.

The 10 best distraction-free writing apps

First, we’re going to introduce the best distraction-free writing apps with a quick overview of what they have to offer. Then, we’re going to focus the rest of this article on helping you choose the right app(s) for you, based on their strengths and weaknesses.

One thing I’ll make clear now is that there are two general types of writing apps here. First, you have WYSIWYG (what you see is what you get) word processors, which are similar to Microsoft Word and Google Docs, where you can highlight text and change formatting by selecting buttons or using keyboard shortcuts – all of which is visible within the document.

Then you have markdown editors, where you pretty much do everything from the keyboard – placing hashtags in front of headings and asterisks in front of bullet point items.

These markdown editors tend to be the more distraction-free writing experiences but that’s an oversimplification – and you’ll see what I mean once you’ve looked at the following apps.

Here are the 10 distraction-free writing apps you need to know about.

#1: Ulysses (Mac, iOS)

£4.49/monthor £35.99/year

Ulysses is a powerful writing app for Mac and iOS that allows you to write content without ever taking your fingers away from the keyboard. Its markdown-based text editor means you’re no longer clicking settings with the mouse; instead, you’ll style things like headings by placing hashtags in-front of your text.

In terms of removing distractions, Ulysses packs a number of features to help you focus on the task at hand.

Key features:

• Distraction-free interface: Feels like you’re writing on a clean sheet of paper without any of the usual distractions found with word processors.
• Markdown-based writing: Ulysses’ text-only editor means you can write and style your content without lifting your fingers away from the keyboard.
• Keyboard navigation: Navigate the Ulysses dashboard from the keyboard.
• Typewriter mode: Only shows the line you’re currently working on to remove all possible distractions.
• Publishing: Publish to WordPress and Medium from within the Ulysses app or schedule them at the push of a button.

Despite all the emphasis on simplicity, Ulysses allows you to create rich documents with images, links, footnotes, blockquotes and everything else you would expect from a word processor. While there’s also a live preview feature to show you what your output is going to look like and built-in export styles for you choose from.

#2: Storyist (Mac, iOS)

£48.50 one-time fee

As the name suggests, Storyist is designed for writers who need to tell a story. Aside from providing a distraction-free writing experience, the app makes it easy to pen out your plot, characters, settings and everything else you need to convey in your story.

While the app is designed for screenwriters, novelists and creative storytellers, Storyist’s features are just as important for today’s content marketers and journalists who need to craft stories around their publishing objectives.

Key features:

• Minimal interface: Not as distraction-free as Ulysses but a minimal interface that keeps your focus on what you’re writing.
• WYSIWYG: With Storyist, you’ll be setting fonts, highlighting text and clicking buttons to style it – more like Microsoft Word than Ulysses.
• Outliner: A tool for outlining your plot, objectives, quotes and other core elements to keep your writing on track at all times.
• Story development tools: Put images to character names or places to give you a visual cue for descriptive writing.
• Word count tracking: Tracks daily and project word count goals to help you stay on track – especially useful for longer pirces/projects.

This app is clearly designed with screenwriters in mind and storytelling writers are going to get the best out of it. If you’re strictly inot bloggin or article writing, then there are probably better choices for you in this article but don’t forget the importance of storytelling in marketing content such as videos and webinars.

#3: iA Writer (Windows, Mac, iOS, Android)

£28.89 one-off fee

iA Writer is another markdown text editor, which allows it ditch all of those buttons and setting for a truly distraction-free interface. Much like Ulysses, you can create documents without your fingers leaving the keyboard.

Key features:

• Distraction-free interface: iA Writer’s interface is one of the most distraction-free editors you’ll come across.
  Markdown-based writing: Create documents entirely from keyboard commands.
• Typewriter mode: Fades everything except the sentence or paragraph yuo’re currently typing to boost your focus.
• Cross-platform: Use iA Writer across Windows, Mac, iOS and Android devices.

This cross-platform functionality is great if you want to use a distraction-free writing app across different devices types and operating systems, especially if you’re jumping between Windows and iOS or Mac and Android. That said, if you’re an Apple loyalist, Ulysses still offers the slightly better set of features – namely its publishing and file management system.

#4: Hemingway (Windows, Mac, web)

$19.99 for desktop, free online app

Hemingway is different from the other writing apps we’re looking at in this article. Aside from providing a distraction-free writing experience, Hemingway aims to make you a better writer by highlighting sentences and paragraphs that are too long, as well as any use of adverbs and the passive voice – three of the most common and serious writing mistakes used by untrained writers.

You can download the Hemingway app for Mac and Windows or use the online app for free.

Key Features:

• Distraction-free writing: Despite the intelligent technology powering Hemingway, it still serves as a great distraction-free writing tool.
• WIZYWIG: Hemingway is still a WIZYWIG editor but this is implemented in a far more simplistic way than apps like Microsoft Word.
• Improve your writing: Hemingway scores the readability of your writing and highlights areas that can be improved to help you become a better writer.
• Free online app: Use Hemingway on any device with an internet connecting by simply typing its URL into your brwoser.

Hemingway is designed to make you a better writer and it also happens to be one of the best distraction-free tools out there. Not to mention the fact you can use the online app for free with the only downside being you can’t save your work (although you can copy and paste into another app or download the full Hemingway app for Windows or Mac).

#5: Byword (Mac, iOS)

£10.99 for Mac, £5.99 for iOS

Byword is an incredibly simple markdown text editor for Mac and iOS. If you’re after the minimalist approach, this is about as distraction-free as it gets and everything you create is fully synced between your Mac and iOS devices.

You can also publish directly to Medium, WordPress, Blogger, Tumbler and Evernote from within the app.

Key Features:

• Distraction-free interface: Super-minimal interface and with a truly distraction-free experience.
• Markdown writing: Format and style your text as you type.
• Sync: All your documents are synced with iCloud and Dropbox so you can access and edit them from all of your Mac and iOS devices.
• Publishing: Publish directly to Medium, WordPress, Blogger, Tumblr and Evernote.

If you’re strictly an Apple user and you’re looking for the truly distraction-free writing experience, Byword is one of the best options available.

#6: Grammarly (Windows, Mac, web)

Free, $11.66/monthor $15/mo

Grammarly isn’t actually a distraction-free writing app; it’s an intelligent spelling and grammar checker that does a pretty good job of spotting basic writing errors – far better than you’ll be used to with spell checkers in apps like Microsoft Word.

What many Grammarly users don’t know is that you can also use it for writing with its ultra-simple document app. You can’t style or format text with the editor – all you can do is type out your title and then just write.

That certainly counts as distraction-free writing in my book.

Key features:

• Grammar & spelling checker: Genuinely useful grammar and spelling checker that works in real-time or after you’ve finished writing if you prefer.
• Distraction-free writing: Grammarly’s document app basically has no features at all but it’s definitely a minimal, distraction-free experience.
• Chrome extension: You can use Grammarly to check your writing as you type online with the Chrome extension.

Grammarly isn’t a word processor or text editor in anyway at all – so don’t expect those kind of features. It’s document app is more like an online notepad without any settings or features to get distracted with.

#7: Evernote (Windows, Mac, iOS, Android, web)

Free, $5.83/monthor $12.50/mo

Evernote’s document app is far more sophisticated than Grammarly – almost to the point where it can replace a fully-featured word processor like Microsoft Word with something far more minimal.

Distraction Free Writing Software

You also get all of the other Evernote features as part of the package: cloud storage, file sharing, web clipper, notes and a whole bunch of things to help you create content.

Key features:

• Minimal writing app: Maybe not quite distraction-free writing but far more minimal than typical word processors with all of the same features and more.
• WYSIWYG: Style your document and see your changes as you make them.
• Cross-platform: Apps for Windows, Mac, iOS, Android and a web app mean you can use Evernote everywhere you need to.

Evernote’s document writer isn’t exactly topping the list of its features but if you’re looking for a balance between distraction-free writing and all the functionality of a word processor (and then some), this is a strong option.

#8: Medium (web)

Free, $5/monthor $50/year

Medium is one of the most popular publishing and content discovery platforms around these days. Its online story interface is as minimal as any distraction-free writing and you only have basic formatting options for titles, links, quotes and basic styles (bold and italic).

That’s it

Of course, the main attraction of Medium is its user base, who are constantly looking for great content to engage with, making this a powerful social/content marketing tool in its own right.

Key features:

• Distraction-free writing: Very minimal writing experience with basic formatting options.
• WYSIWYG: Medium’s story interface doesn’t give you a lot of formatting options but they are WYSIWYG so you can easily see what you’re going.
• Cross-platform: The web app nature of Medium means you can pretty much access it from any device with an internet connection.
• Publishing: The added bonus of using Medium as a content publishing and discovery tool.

Medium’s interface provides a great distraction-free writing experience and this is precisely why it has made onto our list. This, plus the fact it’s essentially a cross-platform option thanks to its web app. The only real downside is you’re limited to publishing to Medium or copy and pasting into another app if you want to publish elsewhere.

Dealbreaker? Well, that’s entirely up to you and it costs nothing to try it out.

#9: Typora (Windows, Mac, Linux)

Free

Typora is another free option that’s technically a markdown editor but it’s worked the whole WYSIWYG experience into things. So you type your hashtags for headings, asterisks for bullet points, etc. and Typora shows you what it’s all going to look like in its interface – all in real-time.

It’s a fully-featured markdown editor, too, which means you can import images by typing file paths, create tables and diagrams, do mathematics and pull off all sorts of magic – all from your keyboard and see the visual results, thanks to that WYSIWYG implementation.

Key features:

• Distraction-free interface: Typora is nothing more than a text editor (like Notepad++) until you start typing – it doesn’t get more distraction-free than this.
• Markdown writing: Format your text, import images and do everything from the keyboard.
• WYSIWYG: Typora is very much a markdown editor but it implements that WYSIWYG experience to give you a better visual idea of what your documents look like in rendered HTML.

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#10: Google Docs (Windows, Mac, iOS, Android, web)

Free

Okay, so I’m really pushing it here by trying to call Google Docs a distraction-free writing app but it’s certainly a more minimal experience than Microsoft Word or similar word processors.

That’s not why I’m recommending it, though. The reason Google Docs makes it onto this list is because it’s one of the best writing apps for teams that want to collaborate and it still offers a fairly minimal writing experience, despite all of the features packed into the platform.

Aside from its collaborative prowess, Google Docs is a truly cross-platform application with apps for just about every OS out there. While the writing app itself isn’t as distraction-free as the other options in this article, you can create, save, edit and share your documents from anywhere and collaborate remotely.

In this sense, the file creation, management and editing processes are where Google Docs kills distractions most effectively.

Key features:

• WYSIWYG: Think a stripped down version of Microsoft Word with all of the same functionality and more.
• Cross-platform: Google Docs kills it in this regard.
• Collaboration: Teams can collaborate on the same documents in the same location or remotely anywhere – all in real-time.

If you’re looking for a truly distraction-free writing experience, Google Docs isn’t going to top your list. In terms of a collaborative tools that accessible from anywhere, on any device, though – this is the one.

Which is the distraction-free writing app for you?

It all comes down to what need from a writing app, which platforms you need to use and how important the distraction-free experience is over other features.

To help you make this choice, we’re going to focus the rest of this article on narrowing your options by looking at the following criteria and recommending the best apps for each of them:

1. Platform availability: First, you need an app that’s supported on all the devices you need to use it on, whether you’re a Windows, Mac, iPhone or Android user.
2. Cross-platformability: How good is the app for using across all of your devices and platforms so you can start work on one machine, finish on another and collaborate with others as you go?
3. Writing features: All of these apps offer a different range of writing features – so which are the ones you really need?
4. Cost & Value: There’s always a budget to work with and you want to know you’re getting the best value for your money.
5. Usability: There’s nothing more distracting than an app that’s difficult to use and this defeats the whole point of what we’re trying to do here. So let’s take at the most usable of the apps mentioned in this list.

Once we’re done with this lot, you should be ready to choose the writing app for you with confidence.

Best apps for your devices and platforms

It doesn’t matter how good a writing app is if it’s not available on the platforms you need it on. So, let’s start by comparing the platforms each of these tools are available on.

While Grammarly and Medium both have mobile apps available, they don’t contribute to the distraction-free experience we’re focusing on in this article, which is why we’ve marked those cells with asterisks.

Best apps for using cross-platform

Now that we’ve compared the platforms each of these tools are available on, it’s not difficult to recommend the best options for cross-platformability. If you need to be moving between devices, operating systems and browsers, these are the first apps you want to consider:

1. Google Docs
2. Evernote
3. iA Writer

The funny thing is, the top two in this category aren’t even distraction-free writing apps in themselves but they nail it when it comes to cross-platformability.

If this is important to you, then these are the top three choices for you.

Best for writing features

The downside with distraction-free writing apps is you tend to sacrifice a lot of writing features for the sake of simplicity. If you only want to type plain text then a regular text editor will do the trick for you – but this isn’t why you’r reading this article.

You want to find a certain balance between distraction-free writing and the features you need to get the job done. Feature-wise, here are your best options:

1. Google Docs
2. Evernote
3. Typora

None of these apps offer the most distraction-free writing experience (although Typora comes close), but you can simply do more with them.

What’s amazing is all of these are available for free, despite packing more features into their tools than the other options.

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Best for cost & value

In order to determine how much you’re getting for your money with these apps, we’ve graded them in three categories:

1. Freedom: How distraction-free the writing experience is.
2. Features: What you get in terms of writing, publishing and document management features.
3. Cost: The relative price of each app.

We’ve compared the pricing of each tool and converted these into scores out of ten (e.g.: free = 10/10) and then calculated an overall score based on the mean average.

Obviously, price factors heavily in this category and the apps that are available for free have a big advantage in this section.

Best for usability

As I said earlier, there’s nothing more distracting than a app that’s difficult to use and all of the tools in this article score well when it comes to usability.

This already makes it difficult to select winners in this category and usability is a fairly subjective thing, too. If you’re coming from Microsoft Word, for example, Google Docs is always going to be easier to get used to than a markdown editor which switches the writing process on its head.

With this in mind, I’m recommending these three options as the most usable for different types of users:

1. Evernote: For users who want the distraction-free writing experience with all the features and WYSIWYG you expect from a traditional word processor.
2. Ulysses: For a truly distraction-free writing experience that makes it easy to make the transition from WYSIWYG to markdown writing.
3. Byword: For the most usable, distraction-free writing experience for people comfortable with markdown editors.

Whichever of these writing apps you choose to work with, usability won’t be a major issue, though. They’re all great in this regard and the ultimate choice will come down to personal preference and the features you need.

Best of all, many of these are free so you can try them out to get a better idea of what you want from a distraction-free writing app.

Don’t let distractions kill your content efforts

Your readers will never fully know the time and effort that goes into producing all of your content and all that matters to them is the end product. In terms of ROI, this is all that matters to your content marketing strategy, too, and every distraction that holds you back reduces the return you get from your content investment.

Finding the tools that to help you hit targets faster are invaluable and among these 10 distraction-free writing apps, I’m sure you’ll find the tool that makes all the difference.

All that’s left now is for you to choose the right app for your needs.

Apple’s Mac App Store has a highlighted app section called “Apps for Writers” which includes a number of good alternative word processing apps called Manuscript Makers, as well as Distraction-Free apps with minimalist interfaces, apps for Journaling & Blogging and apps for saving Notes & Clippings. Let me recommend what I consider the best choice for each of the four categories.

Manuscript Makers

Apple highlights five apps they recommend for this category, including their very own Pages ($19.99). However, I also recommend either Scrivenor ($44.99) or Mellel ($28.99). The other two apps are Movie Draft SE ($29.99) and Ulysses ($29.99).

Scrivener

One of our editors, Tobias Buckell swears by Scrivener, calling it the “gold standard for writing anything larger than 4,000 words.” He also said that he “adores it. It’s the #1 go to app on my machine.” At nearly $45 it is the most expensive app in Apple’s list of recommendations. However, it seems like a case of “You get what you pay for!” It has overwhelmingly good reviews in the app store.

More than a word processor, Scrivenor helps you organize your work and also offers a distraction free interface, even though it didn’t make that list in Apple’s recommendations (see below).

The Corkboard feature helps you gather all of your reference material and ideas so that you can organize your thoughts and create your masterpiece. My college English Composition professor taught me to research and write this way using 3×5 cards. No longer needed with Scrivener.

Mellel

If $45 seems a bit rich, maybe $28 fits your budget better? One of my pastor friends swears by this app because of its handling of Hebrew, thanks to its Israeli developers. Designed for working on long documents like a book or dissertation, it too includes powerful organization functions. For desktop publishers, you will like the layout features and control.

Distraction-Free Writing

I’m not a fan of distraction-free writing. But a few of our writers here at GottaBeMobile and our sister site Notebooks.com use them. Scrivener stands out as the app of choice, as I said above. Strangely, Apple didn’t include it in this category of recommended apps.

The two highest rated apps are Byword ($9.99) and OmmWriter Dana II ($4.99), with WriteRoom ($24.99) the most expensive of these apps just behind them. They also included iA Writer ($9.99) and Writer ($2.99) the cheapest of the apps.

OmmWriter II Dana II

When you judge an app you look at the features and screenshots and then read the reviews. If the first two look good, but the reviews wildly vary as to the quality of an app, it makes it hard to want to download and check it out. Of these apps, two stand out in this third evaluation category – reviews. OmmWriter II Dana II has 249 ratings with 224 of them being 5 star and 13 4 star ratings. That means that of the 249 users only 12 users think it rates 3 stars or below. That led me to download it first.

Aside from the very annoying music or environmental sounds in the background and the ridiculous noises you get from each keystroke, the app is beautiful. You can also change the backgrounds. I was puzzled as to why the developer included these distractions in a distraction free app is puzzling, but once you turn them off and pick a more subdued background, the app measures up to the user reviews.

I like the concept of this app and, if I preferred distraction free writing, I could see how this app would benefit me. I write mostly shorter form content like blog posts, letters and outlined notes for my preaching. But for a long document that doesn’t require a lot of formatting, this style of app would be perfect. I do wish it had one paragraph formatting option – the ability to either indent automatically or to have a small amount of space between paragraphs. You have to do this manually, which annoys me.

Scrivenor and Pages

My recommendation would be to go with Scrivenor if you need a powerful writing and formatting tool but also want an option for distraction-free writing. If you upgraded to OS X Lion, then use Pages if you don’t want to spend as much. You can use Pages in a full screen mode in Lion (see below) but still have access to the formatting tools by mousing to the top of the screen.

Journaling & Blogging

In this category, one app stands out for bloggers – Mars Edit ($39.99). However, the other four apps do something totally different. They let you record your thoughts in a digital personal diary, something I do not do a lot.

Mars Edit

For bloggers who want to write offline, format offline and then upload to their blog, Mars Edit offers the only really good solution on a Mac that I’ve found until Microsoft ports Windows Live Writer. Don’t hold your breath. At $39.99 Mars Edit is expensive, but also clearly the best. It contains a powerful image insertion tool. You can set up the options for your blog to post as a draft or publish write away. It also handles categories and tags quite nicely. If you post to multiple blogs, Mars Edit will let you set them all up and switch easily between them.

I wish that the formatting options were available on a toolbar instead of one drop down menu. You can use keyboard shortcuts for many of them, but not all.

Day One

The Interface of Day One ($9.99) and the recommendations in the app store give this app the nod. The Menu Bar quick entry tool encourages you to write a journal entry quickly and easily. The reminder system also nudges you to journal each day. You can quickly find your entries based on the calendar view or the list view, each of which shows entries according to the date.

The app syncs with DropBox so that you can then access entries on the iOS app ($1.99) as well. You can set a password to keep your thoughts private. The simple interface offers a few formatting tools, but not so many that you get distracted.

If you want to listen to what you wrote, select it, right click and choose either Speech or Add to iTunes as a Spoken Track. That last feature might be worth the price alone if you want to create spoken word documents quickly for someone who likes to listen to your writing or someone who cannot read for some reason.

Notes & Clippings

Of the four apps here, Evernote has to be the most useful for one reason – more people, apps and services use it than any other note taking, gathering organizing or snipping app available on any platform. The other two note taking/clipping apps are Yojimbo ($38.99) and Together ($39.99). I can’t recommend them due to the cost and lack of ubiquity that Evernote provides.

Evernote

With Evernote you can do a few things:

• clip info from various sources like the Internet or from email
• organize info in folders and with tags
• sync info between multiple devices including smartphones, tablets, and computers
• take notes, record audio and snap images

I primarily use Evernote as a shoebox for my information and as a notebook. I save things like tax receipts in one folder. I keep meeting notes from my job in another. I tag these so that I can quickly find them. When I take a trip I save things like hotel receipts and itinerary information to a folder made for that trip. When I have a special project, I create a new folder and save notes to that folder that I need to remember.

I use iPad apps that allow me to make meeting notes with my stylus and import them into Evernote, either by sending them via email or in some cases directly from the apps.

One of my most used apps, Bible Reader from Olive Tree, incorporates Evernote by saving all of the margin notes I take on verses in the Bible to an Evernote folder.

The web interface, iPad app, Android app and computer app all work together to sync all of my notes. I paid for the premium membership ($5/month or $45/year) which gives me all the bandwidth I need (up to 1GB/month). However, even as a heavy user, I seldom go past the allotted bandwidth given to users of the free edition.

Below you can learn how a dairy farmer uses Evernote to help him organize his business.

MindNode Pro

If you like to use mind maps to organize thoughts and brain storm ideas, MindNode Pro ($19.99) might help you become more productive. Mind mapping software lets you visually organize thoughts. For example, if you make presentations, you can set up a mind map with your speech. Put main ideas with supporting ideas connected to the main idea in a visual patter. Create a flow chart of the speech with each point in order and with an introduction and conclusion and all of the supporting material in each of those.

Writers might create a mind map to organize a story or article. MindNode Pro lets you put together mind maps with visual tools. It has plenty of tools for quickly and easily creating charts and organizing your mind maps.

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