What This Diary App Actually Offers
My Diary – Daily Diary Journal is a journaling app aimed at anyone who wants to keep a private digital diary instead of a paper notebook. It lets you write text entries, add photos and videos, record audio, and lock everything behind a passcode or fingerprint. On top of that basic journaling core, it layers themes, stickers, mood tracking, tags, and export options to TXT, PDF, or print. It’s built for people who want a decorative, customizable diary rather than a bare-bones notes app, and with over 70 million installs it’s clearly one of the go-to choices in this category.
Where It Genuinely Shines
The strongest praise from real users centers on ease of use and customization. People who’ve never journaled digitally before, including one reviewer who handwrote a journal for 37 years, say the switch was simple: you type or speak an entry, drop in pictures, choose a theme, and you’re done. The variety of themes, stickers, and backgrounds gets repeated praise, and the fingerprint lock genuinely reassures users who want privacy without the hassle of remembering a passcode. Mood tracking through the calendar is another feature people mention liking, since it gives a visual way to look back at how you were feeling over time.
The Ads and Interruptions Problem
The most consistent complaint is how aggressive the monetization feels. Multiple reviewers describe pop-ups before you can even start writing, banner ads that appear while you’re mid-entry, and video ads afterward, with one user specifically calling this disruptive when they were trying to write through something emotionally difficult. Another reviewer counted four or five combined prompts, ads, and rating requests just to back out of a screen. A permanent subscription removes the ads, but for a diary app meant to be a calm, private space, this level of interruption undercuts the experience for a lot of free users.
Reliability Issues Worth Knowing About
Beyond ads, there are functional gripes. One long-time user reported losing years of unlocked achievements without explanation, which shook their trust in the app’s data handling. Another described a more concrete problem: if you leave the app mid-recording, whether the voice memo finished or not, the draft can wipe the recording entirely, which is a frustrating way to lose an entry. Several users also note that most of the attractive themes are locked behind a premium tier, so the free version’s customization is more limited than the marketing suggests.
Who Should Actually Download This
If you want a free, flexible diary with photos, mood tracking, and a lock screen, and you don’t mind tolerating ads or eventually paying to remove them, this app delivers on its core promise and clearly works well for a large user base. If you’re someone who journals to process difficult emotions in the moment, the ad interruptions and occasional data hiccups are real risks to factor in before you commit your entries to it. Casual users after a decorative, photo-friendly diary will likely get more out of it than those wanting a distraction-free writing space.
