How to import Apple Journal to Innerholm
Apple Journal keeps your entries on your device, which is lovely until you want them somewhere you can open in any browser. The good news: Apple gives you a clean ZIP of everything you have written. Here is how to export it, and honestly what Innerholm does and does not bring across.
To leave Apple Journal with your writing intact: on iPhone or iPad open Settings, tap Apps, tap Journal, then tap Export All Journal Entries and tap Export. On a Mac, open Journal and choose File then Export. Apple saves a ZIP called AppleJournalEntries that holds your entry text plus the photos and media you attached. Innerholm reads that ZIP directly: open the sidebar, click Import at the bottom, choose Apple Journal, and upload it. Your entry text, its date, your starred entries and your photos come across, apart from HEIC originals, which most browsers will not draw and which stay in the ZIP.
Export your Apple Journal, step by step
Open the Journal export setting
On iPhone or iPad, open Settings › Apps › Journal. On a Mac, open the Journal app and go to File › Export. Apple Journal runs on iPhone, iPad, and Mac, so use whichever device holds your entries.
Export all Journal entries
Tap Export All Journal Entries, then tap Export. You may be asked for your device passcode. The export bundles your entry text together with the photos, locations, and other media you added to each entry.
Save the AppleJournalEntries ZIP
When it finishes, the Files app opens. Save the file, named AppleJournalEntries.zip, somewhere easy to find, such as iCloud Drive or your desktop. This single ZIP is your full, portable copy. Keep it even after you migrate.
Bring it into Innerholm
Open Innerholm, click ↑ Import at the bottom of the sidebar, and choose Apple Journal. Upload the ZIP, and look at the preview before you confirm: it shows the first ten entries with their dates, titles and word counts, and how many the file holds altogether. Running the same import twice is safe, so an interrupted one is fixed by doing it again.
Apple Journal export steps verified June 2026 against Apple Support. A single-entry option also exists: open an entry, use Share, and you can save it as a PDF through Print.
What Innerholm keeps from your entries
Innerholm's goal with any import is simple: keep your words and keep them in the right order. Here is what travels across from an Apple Journal export, and where to set expectations honestly.
| Apple Journal | Innerholm | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Entry text | Entry body | The heart of the import; your writing comes across |
| Entry date | Entry date | Original timestamps keep your timeline in order |
| Tags | Tags | Created if new, reused if you already have them |
| Starred entries | Starred | Appears in your starred filter |
| Photos | Photos | JPEG, PNG, GIF and WebP, under each entry; HEIC stays in the ZIP |
| Location | Not stored | Innerholm records a place only when you ask it to, at the moment of writing |
Apple does not publicly document the internal layout of each entry inside the ZIP, so a little contextual metadata may not map one to one. The parts that matter most, your written entries and their dates, are the parts Innerholm prioritizes.
What the importer can and cannot promise
The importer is live, and we would rather be plain about what it is. Apple publishes no schema for the inside of that ZIP, so every field name the parser looks for was worked out from real exports rather than from documentation, and Apple can move any of it in an iOS release without telling anyone.
So the parser is built to fail small. It looks for your entries anywhere in the archive rather than in one expected folder, reads each field by every name it has been seen under, and treats everything except the entry's own identifier as optional. An entry it cannot read is counted and named on the way out; it never costs you the rest of the import. And the preview is there so you see what will land before a word of it is written.
Photos come across, with one exception worth knowing before you start. Apple's export carries the originals, and on an iPhone a lot of those are HEIC, which is Apple's own format and which most browsers outside Safari will not draw. A HEIC photo brought across would be a broken picture in your journal rather than a picture, so those stay in the ZIP where you can still open them. JPEG, PNG, GIF and WebP come in. Keep the file either way: a second import skips everything already here rather than adding to it, so it cannot go back and pick up what it left.
Wondering whether Innerholm is the right home before you move? Read the honest head-to-head: Innerholm vs Apple Journal →
Frequently asked questions
Can I import Apple Journal into Innerholm today?
Yes. Upload the AppleJournalEntries ZIP in Innerholm's import wizard: open the sidebar, click Import at the bottom, and choose Apple Journal. Your entry text, its date and your starred entries come across. Apple publishes no schema for the inside of that ZIP, so the importer reads it defensively and names anything it could not read rather than passing over it in silence. Photos come across where the export saved them as JPEG, PNG, GIF or WebP; HEIC originals stay in the ZIP, because most browsers will not draw one.
How do I export everything from Apple Journal?
On iPhone or iPad, open Settings, tap Apps, tap Journal, then tap Export All Journal Entries and tap Export. Enter your passcode if asked. On a Mac, open Journal and choose File then Export. Apple saves a ZIP named AppleJournalEntries that contains your entry text along with the photos, locations, and other media attached to each entry.
What does Innerholm keep from my entries?
Innerholm keeps your written entries, their original dates so your timeline stays in order, any tags the export carries, your starred entries and your photos. Apple's ZIP holds one file per entry, which is what gives Innerholm the text and the timestamps to map cleanly. HEIC photos are the one thing left behind, and location is deliberately not stored: Innerholm records a place only when you ask it to, on the page you are writing.
Will my photos come across?
The ones your iPhone saved as JPEG, PNG, GIF or WebP do, up to 10 MB each, and they land under the entry they belonged to. HEIC does not, and on an iPhone that is a lot of them: it is Apple's own format and most browsers outside Safari will not draw it, so a HEIC photo brought across would be a broken picture in your journal rather than a picture. Those stay in the ZIP, where you can still open them, so keep that file.
Is anything lost when I leave Apple Journal?
Because the export is a standard ZIP that lives on your own device, you keep a complete copy no matter what. Apple's per-entry format is not publicly documented, so some contextual metadata does not map one to one, and HEIC photos stay in the ZIP rather than coming across. Your words and your dates are the parts Innerholm cares about most, and those come across.
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