The answer points at your own page
Ask an assistant what you thought about a topic and it writes something plausible. Ask IKI and you get sentences from your own saves, with a source that opens the item. When your library has nothing, IKI says so.
iki vs ai assistants
They know everything.
IKI knows what you saved.
ChatGPT, Claude, Perplexity and Gemini are better than IKI at almost everything that starts with a blank prompt. None of them is trying to be the place your own material lives. That’s the difference, and it decides which one you want open.
| Question | IKI | ChatGPT | Claude | Perplexity |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Where your library lives | Markdown files on your device | Their servers | Their servers | Their servers |
| Works with no connection | Yes: capture, search and on-device answers | No | No | No |
| Answers limited to what you saved | Always, with sources from your own files | Only if you paste it in | Only if you paste it in | Searches the web |
| Saving takes | Two taps from any app | Copy and paste | Copy and paste | Copy and paste |
| Your notes train nothing | Nothing leaves the phone unless you ask | Depends on settings | Depends on settings | Depends on settings |
| If you stop paying | Everything still opens; they’re your files | History stays behind a login | History stays behind a login | History stays behind a login |
| A frontier model when you want one | Bring your own Claude key, used only when you ask | Built in | Built in | Built in |
Gemini behaves like ChatGPT for everything in this table, with Google’s account rules on top. For Google’s research notebook, see IKI vs Gemini Notebook
where iki is better
Three things.
Saving is two taps, not a paste
With an assistant, material gets in when you copy it into a chat. With IKI it’s the share sheet, a Safari button, a screenshot or a sentence to your watch, and the reading happens afterwards by itself.
You keep files, not a history
Chat history belongs to the service. IKI writes markdown into a folder you own, so the library survives a lapsed subscription, an app you got bored of, and us.
what they do better
And where you should just use them.
Writing code, drafting from nothing, reasoning about a problem you haven’t saved anything about, searching today’s web: an assistant wins every time. IKI has Apple’s on-device model and, if you want it, your own Claude key for the heavy questions. It isn’t trying to replace the assistant. It just means you stop pasting your life into one.
Start with one save.
Setup takes two minutes, and there’s nothing to organise afterwards.
Free · iPhone, iPad, Apple Watch and Mac · Made for iOS 27