ellThot.

WellThot Jots — Support

WellThot Jots is a finger-first app for writing things down fast — a phone number, a confirmation code read out over the phone, a name and email, a quick shopping list. Write on a Jot with your finger, organize Jots into notebooks, and sync everything to your own iCloud. Made by WellThot LLC.

Contact

Need help, found a bug, or have a feature request? Email support (at) wellthot.com and we'll get back to you. Including your app version (shown at the bottom of the notebooks list) helps us help you faster.

Guides

Short, step-by-step, grouped by what you're trying to do.

Something wrong? A Jot shows on one device but not another, I deleted something by mistake, I need to restore a backup, Pro isn't unlocked on a new device.

Getting started

Writing

Organizing and sharing

Sync, devices and recovery

Jots Pro

Write your first Jot

  1. The first time you open Jots, it opens on a Jot named Welcome, in a notebook called Notebook, with a gray hint across it. Write right on it. For another Jot, tap New Jot (the square-and-pencil icon) at the top right.
  2. Draw with your finger — or an Apple Pencil on iPad, or the mouse or trackpad on a Mac. The ink tools float at the top of the Jot, just under the navigation bar: tap the pen, color, or size button and a small tray pops open with the choices.
  3. That's it. Everything saves automatically as you write.
  4. Tip: after that, Jots reopens where you left off: on the Jot you had open, or the notebook you were in. If you'd gone back to the notebooks list, it opens the Jot you last had open in your current notebook. For a blank Jot, tap New Jot, or from the Home Screen touch and hold the Jots icon → New Jot.

↑ All guides

The three screens

Jots is three screens deep: your notebooks, the Jots inside one, and a Jot you're writing on. Here's what everything does — tap a number to jump to its explanation.

Writing on a Jot

The writing screenA Jot open for writing, with the navigation bar at the top, the floating ink tools below it, and Jot controls along the bottom.123456789
  1. Back — returns to this notebook's Jots.
  2. Undo and redo — as often as you like.
  3. Lock (Pro) — makes the Jot read-only, so a pocket or a toddler can't add to it. Tap the padlock again when you want to write on it. Auto-Lock, in the notebooks list, does this for you every time you leave a Jot you've written on.
  4. More (•••) — Show/Hide Ink Tools, Show/Hide Text on Jot and Recognized Text… (both iOS 27, see Handwriting to text), Jot Settings, Duplicate Jot, Move to Notebook and Delete Jot. Tags, the recognized Text, paper, Jot Size, Recolor All Ink and the Save-as-Default options live inside Jot Settings.
  5. New Jot — a blank Jot, right now.
  6. Ink tools — pen style (Ballpoint, Fountain Pen, Calligraphy, Pencil, Highlighter), nib size, any color, then the eraser and the lasso. Each opens a small tray.
  7. Share — send this Jot as an image, one tap.
  8. Jot arrows — move through the notebook in the order the grid shows. Opened from Recently Modified, Trivial Jots, a tag or a search result, they walk that list instead, across notebooks; a new Jot made along the way goes into the notebook of the Jot you're on.
  9. Portrait / landscape — turns this Jot, and the ink on it, ninety degrees. Every Jot keeps its own orientation; see Landscape Jots.

A notebook's Jots

A notebook's JotsSix Jots in a notebook shown as a grid of thumbnails: a flight change, a grocery list, a plumber's quote, a to-do list, a wifi code and a kitchen sketch.123456
  1. Back — returns to the notebooks list.
  2. Sort — by name, date created, date modified, or size, and switch between the icon grid and a list.
  3. More (•••) — Select Jots, Notebook Settings, both share formats, and Delete Notebook. Paper and the notebook's name are inside Notebook Settings.
  4. New Jot — added wherever the current sort puts it.
  5. Search names and handwriting — always visible; finds Jots in this notebook by name, and by what's written on them once they've been read (iOS 27, or text synced from one).
  6. A Jot — tap to open it. Touch and hold for Jot Settings, Rename, Tags, Paper, Duplicate Jot, Move to Notebook and Delete Jot. Pinch the grid to resize the thumbnails.

All your notebooks

The notebooks listEvery notebook, with a Recently Modified smart notebook above and storage totals below.123456789
  1. Sort — order the notebooks by name or by date.
  2. Search Inside All Notebooks (Pro) — searches Jot names and recognized handwriting across every notebook; a handwriting match shows the line that matched.
  3. More (•••) — Select Notebooks, Import Notebook, New Notebook from Form, and Settings.
  4. New notebook (Pro after the first) — lets you pick its Paper before the first Jot is created.
  5. New Jot — starts a Jot straight away, in the notebook you were last in, without opening it first.
  6. Search Notebooks — always visible; find a notebook by name.
  7. Smart notebooks (Pro) — computed views such as Recently Modified, Empty Jots and Trivial Jots. Read Poorly (free, iOS 27) gathers the Jots handwriting reading struggled with.
  8. A notebook — tap to open. Touch and hold (or swipe) for Notebook Settings, Rename, both share formats, and Delete. Paper is inside Notebook Settings.
  9. Totals — notebooks, Jots and size, plus the app version to quote if you report a bug.

↑ All guides

Add, browse, and rename Jots

  1. In a notebook you'll see all Jots as a grid of thumbnails. Pinch to make them bigger or smaller.
  2. While writing, tap the compose button for a new Jot; the arrows move between Jots in the same order the grid shows.
  3. Jots sort by name, date created, date modified, or size — the Sort menu in the notebook switches between them. A new Jot appears where the sort places it.
  4. To rename: touch and hold a Jot in the grid → Rename. Or, while writing, open ••• → Jot Settings… and edit the name. A renamed Jot moves to where it now sorts.
  5. Need a copy? Duplicate Jot (touch and hold in the grid, or the ••• menu while writing) makes one instantly, numbering the name for you and carrying over your last-used ink.

↑ All guides

Pens, colors, and the lasso

  1. Tap the pen button to choose a style: ballpoint for everyday writing, fountain pen for expressive lines that swell and taper, the calligraphy nib, pencil for a soft tilt-shaded stroke (tilt an Apple Pencil for the effect), or highlighter for translucent emphasis.
  2. The color tray has a full color picker alongside the presets — pick any color, not just the presets.
  3. Found a combination you love? ••• → Jot Settings → Save Ink as Global Default, and new Jots start with that pen from then on — or Save Ink as Notebook Default for just this notebook.
  4. The lasso selects what you've drawn: circle some strokes, then drag them somewhere better — or use Cut, Copy, Paste, Duplicate, and Delete from the menu that appears. Copied strokes paste onto other Jots too.
  5. Want the Jot to yourself? ••• menu → Hide Ink Tools tucks the bar away; the same item brings it back.

↑ All guides

Undo, redo, erase, and recolor

  1. Undo and redo live at the top left while writing — tap them as often as you like. On an iPad with a keyboard, ⌘Z and ⇧⌘Z do the same, and so does the three-finger undo swipe.
  2. The eraser is with the pen tools; it removes whole strokes, so a stray line comes off cleanly.
  3. Recolor All Ink (Jot Settings) repaints every stroke on the Jot to a chosen color, keeping each stroke's pen type and width. One undo reverts the whole Jot.

↑ All guides

Draw right in Messages

  1. Open Messages, go into any conversation, and tap the + (or the gray App Store icon) next to the text box to open the row of iMessage apps.
  2. First time only: if you don't see Jots, tap ••• in that row, then Edit, and turn Jots on. Opening the main Jots app once first can help it show up.
  3. Tap the Draw a Jot card to open a small canvas — it opens on your tap, not automatically; iOS doesn't allow that.
  4. Draw with the same pens, colors, eraser, and lasso as the full app, then tap Add to Message. It drops into the message box — you still tap Send.
  5. Whoever receives it does not need Jots. They just see a picture, sent as-is; there's nothing to import or open.
  6. This is free — no Jots Pro required.

↑ All guides

Bring your own paper

  1. From another app: tap Share on a PDF or scan, then choose Jots. Jots takes a private copy — the original file is never touched.
  2. From inside Jots: notebooks list → ••• → New Notebook from Form…, then pick a PDF already on your device. (The + beside it makes an ordinary notebook.)
  3. Either way, the document becomes the background of a Jot — a form you can write on, or a form letter you're annotating — and every new Jot you add to that notebook offers the same blank form.
  4. Built-in form templates are also available without picking a file: the Form group in a notebook's Notebook Settings → Paper includes templates like "While You Were Away," Meeting Notes, and an Expense Log.
  5. Forms are a Jots Pro feature, like other custom backgrounds.

↑ All guides

Share a Jot or a notebook

  1. A Jot: while writing, tap the share button to send the Jot as an image — Messages, Mail, AirDrop, anywhere. To send the words instead, see Handwriting to text.
  2. A notebook, two ways: touch and hold the notebook in the list (or swipe its row) and pick either one.
  3. Share as PDF — for anyone. Every Jot in the notebook, in the order you're currently sorting it, each one headed with its name and date. They don't need Jots, or anything but a phone. The PDF also carries the text Jots read from each Jot's handwriting (see Handwriting to text), so it can be searched. By default that text is printed in a band under each page; on iOS 27, turn off Settings → Handwriting → Show Text in PDFs for clean pages, and the text stays in the file, invisible, so search still finds it.
  4. Share Jots File — for another Jots. It carries everything (Jots, tags, backgrounds, forms, orientation) and can be imported as a real, editable notebook. A PDF comes back only as paper: opened in Jots, its pages become forms to write on, and the ink already on them can't be edited. A Jots file brings back the Jots themselves.
  5. Several at once: notebooks list → ••• → Select Notebooks, choose more than one, then export or back them up together. A big PDF shows Making PDF… with a page count after a moment; Cancel stops it and nothing is left behind.
  6. To receive a Jots file: notebooks list → ••• → Import Notebook…

One caution. Anything you share leaves the app as a plain, unencrypted file — the image, the PDF and the Jots file alike, and a PDF holds your handwriting's text even when it isn't printed on the page. Inside the app your notes sit behind Apple's device and iCloud protection, but that protection doesn't travel with the file. If a Jot holds an account number or a door code, think about where you're sending it and treat the file as you would any other unencrypted document. See the Privacy Policy.

↑ All guides

Handwriting to text (iOS 27)

  1. On an iPhone running iOS 27, an iPad running iPadOS 27 or a Mac running macOS 27, open a handwritten Jot and tap ••• → Recognized Text… Jots reads the page and shows the text in a sheet under it, with your writing still visible above; drag the sheet up for more room.
  2. Fix anything it misread right there — your edits are kept. Copy the text to paste anywhere, or Share it straight out. Read Again reads the page afresh (it asks first if you've edited the text).
  3. The text stays with the Jot. See it any time in Jot Settings under Text, under the Jot in the notebook's list view, or laid over your ink with ••• → Show Text on Jot — a dashed box you can keep writing under. Show Live Text, in the same menu, reads as you write: the box shows the text with a Live caption and updates when you pause, and when you leave the Jot the full reader reads it once more — that reading is the one kept.
  4. Search it. A notebook's search field reads handwriting as well as names, and so does Search Inside All Notebooks (Pro), which shows the line that matched.
  5. Jots reads each Jot as you leave it, in the background, if it hasn't been read or the ink changed. Settings → Handwriting turns that off. Read All Handwriting…, in the same place, counts your library first and offers two passes: Read New and Changed (Jots not read yet or changed since) and Read Everything Again. Either shows progress with the elapsed time and the Jot it's on, and you can cancel; what's been read stays. It pauses while your device is warm or in Low Power Mode, and while you're in another app — come back and it picks up where it left off. A few hundred Jots take minutes, fewer on a cool phone off the charger.
  6. Read Poorly is a smart notebook that gathers the Jots the reader found nothing on or read badly, worst first. It appears at the top of the notebooks list when there's something in it, and the Read All sheet's Read poorly or not at all line opens it too. Free, like the rest of handwriting.

Recognition runs entirely on your device, using Apple's own handwriting recognizer: no network, nothing sent to us. The text lives with the Jot, in your own iCloud, like your ink. Neat, level, normal-sized writing reads best. Steep slants, giant letters or a page written at several angles read worse, and a whole-page read can occasionally skip a line — that's the recognizer, not something you did. English is what we've tested; other Latin-script languages your device is set to should work too.

On iOS 26 or earlier Jots can't read handwriting, but text read on another of your devices syncs and is shown and searched there just the same. All of this is free; none of it is part of Jots Pro.

↑ All guides

Sync across your devices

  1. Sign in to iCloud with the same Apple Account on each device — that's the whole setup.
  2. Jots syncs through your private iCloud automatically; changes appear on your other devices moments later.
  3. The same Jot open on two devices? Write on either one: ink from the other device appears as it arrives and stays when you carry on writing, and Undo leaves the other device’s ink alone. A lock, a paper change or a turn to landscape made on one device reaches the other too.
  4. Your notes stay in your iCloud — we never see them. See the Privacy Policy.
  5. A Jot on one device isn't on another? Open Settings → Storage on each device and tap Check for Missing Jots. It compares that device with iCloud and names any Jot either side is missing, with its notebook and the date it was made, and says what to do:
    • In iCloud, not on this device: on the device that has the Jot, open its notebook and choose Duplicate Jot. The copy arrives as a new Jot; then trash the original there. Syncing again won't help this case.
    • On this device, not in iCloud: tap Re-sync Everything on this device, then check again.
  6. Jot totals include the Trash, so a Jot sitting in one device's Trash that the other device never had makes the totals differ by one. The check says when that's the reason.

↑ All guides

Jots on a Mac

  1. You need macOS 15 (Sequoia) or later, on an Apple silicon or Intel Mac. Jots comes from the Mac App Store; sign in with the same Apple Account as your iPhone and iPad, and your notebooks follow.
  2. It's the iPad app in a window. Your notebooks come down from iCloud on first launch; counts can read 0 for a few seconds while the Jots arrive.
  3. Write and draw with the mouse or trackpad. Edit → Undo and Redo, and ⌘Z / ⇧⌘Z, do the same as the Undo and Redo buttons.
  4. One window: closing it quits Jots, and opening Jots again brings it back where it was.
  5. Settings is where it is on the iPad: notebooks list → ••• → Settings. There's no Jots → Settings menu item yet, no ⌘N, and no drag and drop. Help → Jots Help opens this page.
  6. On macOS 27 the Mac reads handwriting just as iOS 27 does: Recognized Text…, Show Live Text and Settings → Handwriting are all there. On macOS 15 to 26 it can't read, but text your iPhone or iPad read still shows, and search finds it.
  7. New Jots come out landscape when the window is wider than it is tall.
  8. Saving files: Back Up All Data… opens a save panel, and every Share menu (Share Jots File, Share as PDF, Share as Image) has Save… as well as the people and apps to send to.

↑ All guides

Jots on iPhone Duo

  1. Jots fills whichever screen you're using: the outer one when the phone is closed, the big inner one when it's open.
  2. When the system moves its toolbars to the side of the screen, Jots' buttons go with them, and the bar's own ••• menu holds Jots' ••• items and any button that doesn't fit.
  3. With the phone open, a Jot's page sits to one side of the fold instead of across it, and a pen tray docked at the side lines up with the page.
  4. In a notebook's list view on the inner screen, the columns split at the hinge, so no Jot is folded in half.
  5. There are two magnifying glasses on the side bar of the notebooks list: the top one searches inside all your notebooks (Pro), the bottom one searches notebook names.
  6. We built this with Apple's iPhone Duo simulator; nobody had the real phone yet. If you get one, tell us what feels wrong.

↑ All guides

Settings, backup, and restore

  1. Notebooks list → ••• → Settings holds your default paper & ink, Auto-Lock, Handwriting (iOS 27), Back Up All Data, Restore, Storage (with Check for Missing Jots), your Free/Pro status, Help & Guides, and Contact Support.
  2. Back Up All Data… exports one backup file — save it to Files, a drive, anywhere. On a Mac it opens a save panel. Settings shows when you last saved or sent a backup, and which build made it; canceling doesn’t count. A library too big to restore from one file (over 256 MB, or more than 100,000 Jots) isn’t backed up: Jots says so, and you can back up notebooks one at a time with Share Jots File instead.
  3. Restore All Data… brings a backup back. Restoring replaces what's in the app, so it asks first.
  4. “Jots Couldn’t Save”? Usually the device is out of storage. Your changes are still on screen and Jots keeps trying; free up some space, and don’t close Jots until it has saved.
  5. A backup is a plain, unencrypted file holding every Jot you have — so keep it somewhere you'd be comfortable keeping any unencrypted copy of your notes. If you want it encrypted, put it somewhere that does the encrypting for you.

↑ All guides

Trash and recovery

  1. Deleted Jots go to the Trash notebook, not into thin air.
  2. Open Trash and touch and hold a Jot to Restore it — or Delete Permanently.
  3. Empty Trash clears it all; that one can't be undone.

↑ All guides

Landscape Jots and Jot Size

  1. Each Jot has its own orientation. A new Jot adopts the way you're holding the device.
  2. To switch a Jot, tap the orientation button at the bottom right while writing.
  3. Turn your device to view a landscape Jot full size, like a photo.
  4. Jot Settings… also has Jot Size — change an existing Jot's shape (Tall, Letter, or A4) without starting over. Ink stays exactly where it is; if shrinking would hide ink, it warns you first. Doesn't apply to form or photo-background Jots.

↑ All guides

Move Jots and use tags (Pro)

  1. Touch and hold a Jot → Move to Notebook… to refile it — it pre-selects the notebook you used last time. Select several Jots first to move them together.
  2. Tags add a second way to organize: touch and hold a Jot → Tags…. Each tag appears as a smart notebook that gathers its Jots from everywhere.
  3. Smart notebooks at the top of the list do their own gathering: Recently Modified collects your latest work, and Empty Jots rounds up blank strays ready for cleanup. Open a Jot from one and the arrows page through that list, across notebooks.

↑ All guides

Paper & ink defaults (Pro)

  1. Paper and ink defaults work at three levels: Settings (applies everywhere), a notebook's Notebook Settings… (applies to that notebook), and a Jot's Jot Settings… (applies to that Jot). Each level falls back to the one above it when nothing more specific is set.
  2. Pick a paper template (lines, grid, dots, Notecard, Stationery, a writing-guide paper…), tint its color, or use a photo or PDF from your library. The Paper chooser is one list with one checkmark: Plain first, then Fancy Paper and Form — tap a heading to open or close its group, and Jots remembers which are open. Plain's colors are under Paper Color, below the list, with Line Spacing under that.
  3. Backgrounds are per Jot — one Jot can be graph paper while the next is a form or stays blank.
  4. Found a paper or ink you like? A Jot's Jot Settings has four buttons to make it stick: Save Paper as Notebook Default, Save Paper as Global Default, Save Ink as Notebook Default and Save Ink as Global Default.

↑ All guides

Lock Jots and Auto-Lock (Pro)

  1. Tap the padlock while writing to make a Jot read-only — no more stray marks from a pocket or a toddler. Tap again to unlock.
  2. Auto-Lock Jots (in Settings) locks each inked Jot automatically when you leave it — and unlocks it again when you return to it, so the Jot you're on is always ready to write. Locks you set yourself with the padlock stay locked until you unlock them.
  3. To lock or unlock several Jots at once, select them in the grid and use Lock.

↑ All guides

Jots Pro — what it is, buying, restoring

  1. Jots is free with one notebook — unlimited Jots, every drawing tool, the Messages app, sync, backup, and Trash included. Creating a second notebook, forms, tags, backgrounds, cross-notebook search, and Jot locks are where Pro begins. See the full comparison.
  2. Jots Pro is a one-time purchase — no subscription — that unlocks unlimited notebooks, forms, tags & smart notebooks, custom paper, cross-notebook search, and read-only Jot locks — including Auto-Lock.
  3. Tap any Pro feature and the Jots Pro screen appears with the price; buying takes one tap through the App Store.
  4. Bought it already? On a new device, or after reinstalling, tap any Pro feature to open the Jots Pro screen, then Restore Purchase. Use the same Apple Account you bought it with.

↑ All guides

Frequently asked

Is my data private?

Yes. WellThot Jots collects no data: no sign-up, no ads, no tracking. Your notes stay on your device, and if you use iCloud they sync through your own iCloud account — never our servers. Jots works fine with iCloud turned off. See our Privacy Policy.

Does Jots work with Apple Pencil?

Yes — Jots is finger-first, so it never requires a Pencil, but on an iPad a Pencil works beautifully, and the Pencil ink style responds to its tilt.

Does Jots do handwriting recognition?

Yes, on iOS 27, iPadOS 27 and macOS 27: on a Jot, ••• → Recognized Text… The text stays with the Jot and search finds it. See Handwriting to text. Earlier versions can't read handwriting — it relies on the recognizer Apple ships with iOS 27 — but text read on a 27 device syncs to them and is searchable there.

A Jot shows on one of my devices but not another. What do I do?

Run Settings → Storage → Check for Missing Jots on each device; it names the Jot and the fix. See Sync across your devices.

— WellThot LLC