Capture · Retrieve

The thought you have now is the thought future you will need.

Captrieve solves a single problem: You have a thought you do not want to lose, and you want to remember it when you can put it to use.

You remember to do something – when you can't do anything about it, so you have to remember it again at the right time.

You need to pick up that thing at the store, say something just that way when you have that tough conversation, or that sales conversation.

You have to work that idea into a character's backstory, put that riff in that song, finally remember to make that call, do that task, … and you are in the car right now, driving. You are in bed right now, and instead of having a million unfinished things streaming through your head, escaping almost as quickly as they arrive, you just want to go to sleep but not forget them!

So you hope you will remember these things when you can act on them. How's that working for you?

In desperation, you dictate it to Siri or Alexa to put in a note, and forget to ask for it later, or you put it in a Google doc, or even a spreadsheet, and it sits there, passively, not reminding you. It sits there, unindexed, so it's hard to find even if you remember to go looking for it. Or you stop what you're doing, open your reminders app, type it in as a task, pick a trigger like geofencing, and hope – users will tell you how often those fail to fire. And what if you needed to capture a tone of voice, or a melody – nope.

What if your ideas took just a few seconds to record, and came looking for you the next time you are at your computer, the next time you are leaving work to go home, the next time you are in the kitchen, the next time you meet with that client, the next time you are at a doctor appointment, or just before you give that speech? Wow. That's a whole different ballgame.

Captrieve makes your ideas reappear when and where you tell them to.

App Store Google Play

How it works

Three steps.
That's the whole thing.

Captrieve: You capture a thought when you have it, and it shows up when you need it.

Capture it

Tap, speak, done – before the thought is gone. (Captrieve is a great assignment for your phone's action button.)

Tell it when or where

Set a cue based on time, proximity to a named WiFi network, your car, your home, your job, or 20 minutes after leaving work, or 15 minutes before arriving at home, or the next time you are at your computer, or when your flight lands, or when you get a minute to play your guitar, or just before you go to bed, or as soon as you wake up, or …

It finds you

At the right moment, in the right place, it presents itself to you without you having to even remember that you have something to remember.

There are more ways to cue a retrieve than you might expect. See all cue types →

What's actually happening

You've had a smartphone for years. The idea you had in the shower is still gone.

The question isn't whether your phone is capable. It's whether you're actually capturing and retrieving things reliably right now. For most people, the honest answer is no.

The voice memo you'll get to later

It's in a pile of other voice memos. Unlabeled. Unindexed. Waiting for you to remember it exists and go listening through them all to possibly find it. Later never comes, or comes too late, or takes too long.

The note that goes nowhere

You captured it. It went into a pile. The moment when it would have been useful passed while it was sitting there. Capture without retrieval is just not admitting you are going to forget anyway.

The reminder you dismissed

It fired at 2 PM on Tuesday. You were in the middle of something. You dismissed it. 2 PM Tuesday was never the right moment anyway. The pharmacy was the right moment, and the reminder was never going to know that.

On iPhones

Geofencing is semi-reliable (which means not reliable) and gets worse as your battery level goes down. Alternative indicators of location such as connecting to a particular WiFi network help, but require you to take steps like hand-creating a Shortcut, something confusing and time consuming that the vast majority of users never do. When geofencing does work, Captrieve lets you do things like when I leave work AND it's after 5, but not if I leave work for lunch, for an off-site meeting, or to take a short break and go on a walk. Does Apple give you that without Captrieve? No.

On Android

Google removed location-based reminders entirely in late 2025. They cannot be created or received anymore. On Android, this category is simply non-existent.

See what it actually takes to do this without Captrieve →

Who is Captrieve for?

People who forget things (everyone)

"Why can't I remember to make that call when I am at home in the evening?"
"Oh yeah, I promised I would go to Laura's game on Saturday, and to Michael's play next Friday. I have to put those things in my calendar when I get home."
"I must tell Klaus about the new direction I want to take when we meet with the Board."
"I can't forget again! We're out of triple-A batteries, and low on toilet paper. Stop at Target on the way home."

In fact, you can do these things without Captrieve, but do you even know how? Are you having Siri or Alexa make reminders for you, but then having them show up when it's still not a good time to act on them? Bottom line: Are you getting them done?

Creative people

Inspiration strikes when it strikes. Captrieve captures it at the speed it arrives and delivers it back when you are positioned to use it – at the studio, at the desk, at the piano, in the setting where the work happens.

Musicians, writers, visual artists →

People with ADHD

The thought was there and then it was just gone. You wrote it down but never looked at the note. What note? Is there a note somewhere? The reminder fired at 2 PM on Tuesday and you dismissed it because you were in the middle of something else. And now it's gone again.

Captrieve is different from a reminder because it fires in context – when you walk into the pharmacy, when you sit down at the piano, when you get in the car. The context provides a reminder at the time you can actually use it.

How Captrieve works for ADHD →

People managing their health and memory

You waited six weeks for that appointment. You had three questions. The doctor asked if there was anything else, and you said no, because the questions were gone.

Capture the question the moment it occurs to you – in the middle of the night, in the car, whenever. It actively reminds you when you walk through the clinic door. Not in a note you have to remember to look at. Right then, right there.

Health info is sensitive. Nothing leaves your phone. No account, no cloud, no one watching.

Families and caregivers

Set Captrieve up for someone you care for. Know they are moving through their day, or know to call them if they are not. Share a thought that finds them at exactly the right moment. Help them remember their medications, and their appointments. Learn more →

From people using it

I was working on a new piece of music for my band, and really struggling with the bridge. It came to me on a walk, and it was really good! I hummed it into Captrieve and told it to cue me when I got to my piano. When I sat down at the piano, there it was, instead of me not being able to recall it from memory! I don't know how I worked before this.

– Jim F., singer, songwriter, keyboardist

My daughter used to worry that I'd forget my questions at the doctor and just say everything was fine. Now I capture them when I think of them, and when I walk into the doctor's office, my phone reminds me of all my questions. Last visit I remembered to ask about a medication reaction, and it turns out that it mattered.

– Carolyn M., retired teacher

As a person with ADHD, ideas fly in and out of my mind all the time. Now I use Captrieve with NFC tags all over my house – in the kitchen, on my guitar, at my desk, on my TV. It not only reminds me of the thing I need to do, the song I want to learn to play, the show I heard about and want to watch, but the habit of tapping an NFC tag in all of these places is actually training me to remember stuff on my own, just just from being in those places!

– J. E. M., full-time student, part-time crazy person