Ulysses, the app I now hold dearest to my heart, and the one topic I’ve been chewing people’s ears off with in the past weeks since discovering it. If you’re a writer, a blogger, poet, or creator of any sort that benefits from a written library at your disposal, you’ll soon understand why you need this app if you want to master your writing workflow and not just level it up here and there.
But first let me tell you my story, what was my setup before and after, so you can see the comparison and understand how much of a difference an efficient app can make. Then we can jump into the juicy details of the features, pros and cons, and anything else you’d like to know.
My writing before
You’d think after 15 years of writing, I would have already had a master setup and workflow for my craft, but unfortunately that was not the case.
Since I can remember, I have been religiously following my ideal writing routine: candles, pine or forest-scented incense, my dedicated soundtrack for Moonrose books (my Spotify is as carefully ordered as my writing library), and the boundless potential of my imagination.
But those are just external, ambiance details. What about the writing app itself? So far, I have stayed loyal to the much antiquated Metapad (yes, the Metapad, and I’m probably the only writer to do so), simply because it allowed for customization of the interface, including a transparent background which made for very inspired writing against a wallpaper of my own making, capturing the magical, soaring landscapes of the Moonrose world.
I’ll be frank, I have never dabbled much with Word docs, or Google docs, or any such applications. I’ve always winced at the idea of writing against a canvas as blank and snowy white as, well, writer’s block. So I stuck to the guns that I knew, however primeval they were.
Discovering the Ulysses app
Divine inspiration must have been the culprit, that after 10-15 years I suddenly decided to search for a writing app, which I have never done before – only to find the perfect one within minutes.
Slowly but surely, I was lured in by Ulysses‘ confident tagline: The ultimate writing app. I appreciate confident. It either lives up to its high claims, or it doesn’t.
I experimented with the app, found that I could customize and organize my writing library — folders, subfolders, sheets, favorites, what have you — to my heart’s content. I could customize the fonts, icons, the interface, through preset themes or I could just create my own. If you know me, you know I’m a big fan of customization. Whatever I’m using, whether it’s clothing, jewelry or a writing app, I need it tailored to my taste. (After all, I designed a symbol for my book and had it custom made by a jeweller into a silver amulet, at the bold age of 18. I knew what I liked then, and I do now. Life’s too short not to beautify everything around you.)
I could also access instant stats like word count, set goals, see progress, check outline and notes for each file. Useful things that I never really used when I had Metapad, because I had no system for it.
Sounded great so far, but I was still hesitating for logistics reasons. I preferred writing on a Windows PC because it’s what I was used to, and as a creator, familiar routine was and is my bread and butter. Could I really get used to a new app, a new routine, me of all people, who greatly treasures the things that work, because why change it if it works?
Except it didn’t! Well, not as well as I wanted. My productivity was about 20%, if I’m completely honest. I would work on the Arcanum of Thorns series once every other month or so, when inspiration hit like a tidal wave and I had no choice but to succumb to the force of nature that is the muse; nevermind the messy setup, my collection of snippets, quotes, outlines, chapter guides and more, all scattered over the virtual landscape of my laptop.
I had a routine yes, but I didn’t really have a sustainable system. Getting into (and staying in) the groove of writing Arcanum of Thorns or any other book was a capricious, calculated process. A little like playing Twister by multitasking the endless array of details I wanted to weave into the story and which I had saved in some folder, paper sketchbook, post-it or other. They were all there somewhere, I just had to find them, but it was the absence of a streamlined workflow that only aggravated any writer’s block, and did nothing to appease further motivation.
And that’s not to even mention my writing setup for blog articles, working on new books or other content, all of which came with their own package of curious recipes.
And so, I wanted to give the app a thorough chance.
I discovered it can also connect my writing to platforms like WordPress and Medium, and export my content into various formats looking as professional and pristine as ever. By then, I was hooked about 70%. Particularly because I use exactly those platforms! WordPress for my website/blog, Medium for additional blogging.
My favorite feature of all however must be using the Editor Only view, where the text fills the whole screen, and nothing else. No distractions. Just the smooth, delicious flow of words come as they may. That, and a mix of Editor Focus and Typewriter Mode are a genius combination because it lets you, the writer, focus on one single task: writing. That’s it. It’s the only thing that fills the screen (see picture below).
At that point, I had dipped my toes enough into the water, now it was time to leap and see if the end result would be sinking or swimming.
Instead, there was a little hiccuping — on the end of encoding, formatting and other such trivia — during the process of transferring my manuscript from txt format into the app. Mind you, Arcanum of Thorns’ 2nd book which is what I’m currently working on, is well over 100,000 words at this point and it’s only halfway through.
Initially I kept the whole manuscript in one sheet (I know, I know), until I realized, for all intents and purposes, that was an old habit I no longer had a practical purpose for keeping. It just made sense to do when I was using Metapad, to access it all in one file. And so, I divided my manuscript neatly with each chapter in a separate sheet and everything was peachy after.
My writing with Ulysses app
I launch the app.
When I open my manuscript, I just review the last paragraphs to get my bearings, and then I’m ready to type away. “Action!” the director of my imagination exclaims, and the story continues.
Everything is streamlined, every folder is crisply organized, and my writing workspace is already set up, everything I need is at my fingertips.
Chapter guide? Check. Snippets folder for that particular book of that series, or the latest scene I’m working on which is 5 chapters ahead so it’s located in a Scenes folder on its own? Check. It’s all organized, favorited and tidied up to perfection.
I can access my whole library both from my phone and MAC, perfectly synched and backed up, no more hassle with copying files and creating backups on email accounts and external drives and whatever else.
What I like most about this setup, is that I have my manuscripts at my disposal any time, anywhere — even in the middle of a roadtrip hundreds of miles away from home, savoring a cup of Earl Grey in the mountains with mist blanketing my shoulders.
If I’m caught up with daily errands or life simply gets in the way, I can just shuffle to my folder with completed articles, and publish straight from the app. No time to go to WordPress and tweak the post for an hour? No problem. Select, schedule, done.
Nowadays, I find myself glued to my devices, because the magical world of my books is just one click away. In the morning when I sip on my tea, in the afternoon after work or at night, I keep adding ideas, whirling up new scenes to add to my story, adding a few more lines to the latest chapter . . . In other words, I’m finally writing with the efficiency I’ve always wanted, instead of getting stuck on writer’s block for weeks or months on end, due to the lack of an efficient writing system.
I never thought I’d say this, but it’s now a challenge to not binge-write every day — whereas previously I didn’t know how to push myself to write more often. I went from 20% productivity to, dare I say, 100%. The only way I could write more at this point is if I wrote all day, which is personally not my goal since I work on my business fulltime, and books are only one among many things on my products list.
But since writing will always be my true calling, I actually wonder if Ulysses might consider a lifetime subscription option in the future — because if yes, sign me up, I’ll be needing this app for a long, long time.
So long, Metapad. Our time together was long and turbulent, but I always knew better things were coming, and now I have found it.
Pros and Cons
Pros:
- iCloud storage.
- Automatic backups.
- Same functionalities and access on both desktop and phone.
- Affordable price.
- Highly organized library, endless folders, groups and sheets. You can choose different icons and colors for each one, to better organize your library to your needs.
- Customizable interface (there are in-built themes which you can use, or design one of your own). The app’s site has a library of themes you can additionally choose from.
- Statistics (word count, character count, reading time).
- You can add attachments to each sheet (ie. images).
- Options that increase productivity by decreasing distraction: Editor Mode and Typewriter Focus.
- Easy onboarding: as the user, each step gives you clarity to what is happening, the tutorial on first launching the app is straight-forward and informative, so you understand from the start how everything works. Personally, nothing turns me off an app more than a confusing app that has no tutorials or onboarding process.
- Intuitive, user-friendly interface.
- Favorites option to bookmark whatever sheets/texts you want, so they are always just a click away.
- Option to connect account with Medium or WordPress platform and publish a post directly from the app, anytime, anywhere.
- Option to export to multiple formats that are preset with professional styles: epub, doc, pdf, etc.
- Choice between Light mode or Dark mode, there’s an additional Dark Theme option which enhances the experience (dims all visuals with one click, so you don’t have to create or edit a theme for it).
- Great support. I reported several bugs and they were keen on replying to each and asking for more details in order to replicate and fix the issues. For some reason, I’ve not experienced that with any other app I reported bugs for. I’ll be honest, a product’s support experience is important to me because I feel it reflects the company’s values. A quality product will always have quality support as well, because they consider the user’s experience from start to finish.
Cons:
- Not available on Windows or Linux OS, only Apple OS. Only one OS platform but they do it well.
- Not ideal for high count manuscripts (100k+) to be kept in one sheet, various actions can cause it to crash at times. This has been reported to support though, and they are working on fixing it. (The workaround for this is just use a new sheet for each chapter, or avoid reaching 100k mark in one sheet alone like I did.)
- Transferring my manuscript from a Windows txt file caused some inconvenience in encoding/formatting issues, but I did fix it by selecting the encoding manually and copying them over.
Conclusion
- Overall rating: 5/5
- Suitable for: authors, bloggers, poets, writers of any kind
- Cross-app integration with: Medium, WordPress
- OS compatibility: designed for Apple OS only (MAC, iphone, ipad)
- Price: monthly plan ($5.99), yearly plan ($49.99), student plan ($10.99)
The great question: Is ULYSSES worth it?
Yes. No other software compares. It is a minimalist one, which essentually builds on the native Notes app from Apple, but it improves upon it with laser-focus on a writer’s needs. What more could you ask for?
You can read more on their site or go ahead and try it out for free using their 2 week trial, and decide if it’s the right solution for your writerly needs.
I hope this lengthy article was helpful, and that my own story and setup inspires you to master your own, so that you may enjoy as much inspiration and efficiency in your creative endeavours.
2 Responses
This is my favourite app too – this was a lovely review and introduction!!!
Thank you Leopold! I’m glad to hear it was helpful for other fellow writers and bloggers.