Story Architect vs Zettlr
Story Architect
starc.appZettlr
zettlr.comSide by side
| Figure | Story Architect | Zettlr |
|---|---|---|
| Price from | $4.17/mo | Free |
| Free plan | Yes | Yes |
| Free trial | Yes | — |
| Open source | Yes | — |
| Windows | Yes | Yes |
| macOS | Yes | Yes |
| Linux | Yes | Yes |
| iOS | Yes | — |
| Android | Yes | — |
| Plans published | 12 | 1 |
| Spec score · Writing Apps | 9.3 (#5) | 8.3 (#41) |
| Free plan | Yes | Yes |
| Platforms | The download page lists apps for macOS, Windows, Linux, iOS/iPadOS and Android. | Windows,macOS,Linux |
| Purpose | Story Architect is an all-in-one writing app for screenplays, comics, plays, books and other story forms organized in a shared project bible. | Zettlr is a publication workbench for writing projects from initial notes through journal submission or book manuscripts. |
| Support | The pricing FAQ directs users to [email protected] for help. | Users can seek community help through the forum and Discord, consult the manual, or report errors on GitHub. |
Plans
Story Architect
- FreeFree
- Pro$4.17 a month
- Creator$8.34 a month
- AI credits 50$10 a month
- AI credits 200$30 a month
- AI credits 500$60 a month
- AI credits 1000$100 a month
- AI credits 50$10, paid once
- AI credits 200$30, paid once
- AI credits 500$60, paid once
In their own words
Story Architect
Story Architect is a writing app for screenplays, comics, plays, books and other story forms, organized around a shared project bible. Its Free plan allows unlimited projects and documents per project, with basic writing, character, location and world tools. Pro adds mind maps, an image gallery, presentations, a corkboard, a timeline and five AI credits per month when billed annually. The AI assistant can paraphrase, summarize, expand or shorten text, translate, insert text between paragraphs, or generate text from a prompt; these actions use credits. Creator adds real-time collaboration and 5 GB of cloud storage. Story Architect supports offline use on Android, iOS, Linux, macOS and Windows. It imports KIT Scenarist, Final Draft, Celtx, Trelby, TXT, ODT, DOCX and Fountain files, and exports DOCX, PDF, FDX and Fountain. Desktop-to-mobile project synchronization remains in development, with manual file transfer documented instead. Pro costs $4.17 a month billed annually; Creator costs $8.34 a month billed annually.
Zettlr
Zettlr is a writing workbench for projects that can run from early notes through journal submissions and book manuscripts. It began as a Markdown editor for academic researchers and is also used by students, journalists, authors, and others writing substantial amounts. The app works offline on Windows, macOS, and Linux, and files stay on the user's computer. It supports standard Markdown and exports to formats supported by Pandoc. Citation manager support includes Zotero, JabRef, and Juris-M, with more than 9,000 citation styles. Note features include IDs, wiki-style internal links, related files, navigation, and graph view. Pandoc-powered profiles can apply templates to papers or prepare presentations for Beamer, reveal.js, or PowerPoint. Zettlr also renders LaTeX equations and Mermaid charts and supports extensive settings and custom CSS. It is free and open source, with no payment required to download. The maker says app data is not collected and update checks can be disabled. Older releases are unsupported; nightly releases may contain many bugs.