Proton Notes: Will It Ever Come Out?

When Proton acquired Standard Notes back in April 2024, the privacy community took notice. An end-to-end encrypted note-taking app joining forces with the world’s most recognized privacy-focused ecosystem seemed like a natural fit. But more than a year on, many users are still asking the same question: will Proton Notes ever actually come out? Here’s everything we know about what happened to Standard Notes — and where a dedicated Proton Notes product stands today.

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What We Know So Far

In April 2024, Proton officially announced that Standard Notes would be joining the Proton family — following a similar playbook to their earlier acquisition of SimpleLogin. Standard Notes is a well-regarded, end-to-end encrypted note-taking application with over 300,000 active users, available across mobile and desktop platforms. The acquisition was framed as a natural alignment of mission: both organizations share a commitment to privacy, community ownership, and sustainable technology. Since then, however, formal communication about what comes next has been limited. At a Reddit AMA hosted by Proton CEO Andy Yen in late 2024, questions about Standard Notes were addressed briefly, with the consistent answer being that nothing definitive had been decided yet regarding rebranding, integration, or subscription bundling.

What is clear is that Standard Notes continues to operate as a standalone product for now. Proton has not officially announced a “Proton Notes” rebrand, nor has it confirmed whether Standard Notes will be folded into Proton Unlimited as an included feature. The community is watching closely, but the roadmap — at least publicly — remains largely undefined for this particular product.

Community Excitement Building

Despite the radio silence from Proton’s official channels, the appetite for a fully integrated Proton Notes experience is enormous. On Reddit’s r/ProtonMail community, threads regularly surface asking for updates on the Standard Notes integration. One particularly upvoted post — with dozens of engaged responses — specifically called out the five-month milestone since the acquisition and asked whether users could expect a bundled subscription or a formal rebrand under the Proton umbrella. That post alone garnered 56 upvotes and a wave of enthusiastic replies from users who had been waiting for exactly this kind of clarity.

The sentiment in those discussions is remarkably consistent: people love what Standard Notes already is, and they want Proton to preserve what makes it great while extending its reach to the broader Proton user base. For privacy-conscious users who have already moved their email, calendar, cloud storage, and documents into the Proton ecosystem, having to maintain a separate Standard Notes subscription — or worse, rely on an unencrypted alternative — feels like an unnecessary gap. The community wants that gap closed, and they want it closed soon.

Why Proton Notes Matters

Notes are deeply personal. They capture fleeting thoughts, sensitive plans, passwords jotted down in a hurry, meeting summaries, medical reminders, creative ideas, and financial records. Yet the dominant note-taking platforms — Google Keep, Apple Notes, Microsoft OneNote, and Evernote — are built on business models that involve data analysis, cloud storage without meaningful encryption, or both. For users who take privacy seriously, that is a significant problem that has gone unresolved for too long in the mainstream market.

Standard Notes already solves this problem elegantly with its zero-knowledge, end-to-end encrypted architecture — the same foundational principle that underpins Proton Calendar and the rest of the Proton suite. A fully branded Proton Notes product, integrated into the Proton Unlimited subscription, would bring that protection to millions of additional users who might never have discovered Standard Notes on its own. For journalists, activists, legal professionals, and everyday privacy advocates, that kind of seamless, encrypted note-taking would not be a luxury — it would be a baseline expectation.

What to Expect Next

Based on how Proton has handled past acquisitions and product launches, a gradual and deliberate integration is the most likely path forward. Proton’s track record — with Proton Docs, Proton Sheets, and SimpleLogin — shows that the company prefers to take its time, preserve what works, and release products when they are genuinely ready rather than rushing a half-finished experience to market. For Standard Notes specifically, that likely means a period of quiet internal alignment before any public announcement about branding, pricing, or Proton Unlimited inclusion.

If you want to accelerate that timeline, the most effective thing you can do is make your voice heard. Proton’s community forums and UserVoice platform have a demonstrated history of influencing product decisions — community demand was a major driver behind both Proton Docs and Proton Sheets reaching general availability. Voting on feature requests related to Standard Notes integration and leaving constructive, detailed feedback about what you need from a Proton Notes product is genuinely worth your time. You can also continue using Standard Notes directly in the meantime, as it remains an excellent and fully functional product in its own right.

The Bigger Picture

A fully integrated Proton Notes would be more than just a convenient addition — it would represent a meaningful step toward making Proton a truly complete, privacy-first alternative to the Big Tech productivity stack. With Proton Mail, Proton Drive, Proton Calendar, Proton VPN, Proton Docs, and Proton Sheets already in place, notes are one of the last remaining pillars of daily digital life that the ecosystem has yet to formally claim. Adding a polished, end-to-end encrypted note-taking experience under the Proton brand would make the case for a full migration away from Google Workspace or Microsoft 365 practically undeniable. You can read more about how Proton approaches its broader mission in our Proton sustainability overview.

There is no confirmed release date for Proton Notes, and no official rebrand of Standard Notes has been announced. But the acquisition has already happened — the foundation is there, the demand is clear, and Proton’s trajectory makes it a question of when, not if. For privacy-first users waiting to complete their encrypted workflow, that is a reason to be genuinely optimistic.

Stay tuned to Proton’s official blog and community forums for the latest updates on Standard Notes integration and any Proton Notes announcement.