A powerful, AI-enhanced creative writing application that helps authors craft compelling stories with intelligent assistance for plot development, character creation, narrative structure, and rich media integration.
CreativeWriter is available in two editions:
- Hosted — Fully managed, just sign up and write
- Self-Hosted — Deploy with Docker, MIT licensed, full control over your data
This repository is the community hub for bug reports, feature requests, and discussions — covering both editions. It does not contain application source code.
CreativeWriter was originally built as a PouchDB (client) + CouchDB (server) application with offline-first sync. While this architecture worked, it had significant limitations:
- Complex conflict resolution — PouchDB/CouchDB sync required manual handling of document conflicts, especially with concurrent edits across devices
- No row-level security — CouchDB's per-database security model couldn't enforce fine-grained access control
- Manual infrastructure — Self-hosting required Docker containers, nginx reverse proxies, and manual CouchDB administration
- No real-time cross-device sync — Changes only synced on reconnect, not in real time
- Fragile media handling — Binary attachments in CouchDB were cumbersome and bloated replication
The new architecture uses Supabase (PostgreSQL + Auth + Storage + Realtime), which provides:
- Proper row-level security (RLS) on every table
- Managed infrastructure with zero ops overhead
- Real-time sync across all devices and tabs via Supabase Realtime
- Cloudflare edge deployment for fast global access
- Supabase Storage for reliable media handling
This resulted in two editions:
| Edition | Description | Link |
|---|---|---|
| Hosted | Fully managed at creativewriter.dev — just sign up and write | creativewriter.dev |
| Self-Hosted | Docker deployment, MIT licensed, full control | creativewriter-selfhosted |
Both editions run on the new Supabase stack. The old PouchDB/CouchDB code is preserved in the archive/pouchdb-couchdb branch for reference.
Navigate your story with a hierarchical sidebar, visual outline, and rich text editing with embedded images.
Collapsible sidebar showing your full story hierarchy — acts, chapters, scenes, and beats.
Bird's-eye outline view of your entire narrative structure.
ProseMirror editor with images embedded directly in your story text.
Write at the beat level — provide input, generate with AI, and revise until it's right.
Write a brief beat description to guide AI generation.
Agentic generation reads your outline, codex, and prior scenes to write contextually aware prose.
Rewrite with different instructions or restore previous versions from beat history.
Chat with your scenes, talk to your characters, and run deep research — all AI-powered.
Ask questions about your scene — the AI uses your full story context to answer.
Talk to your characters directly. The AI uses codex entries to stay in character.
Deep research mode for historical, scientific, or cultural details relevant to your story.
Build a knowledge base for your story's universe — characters, locations, factions, and more.
All your world-building entries at a glance — searchable and organized by type.
Generate character portraits directly from codex descriptions.
Story analyzer checks character consistency across your entire manuscript.
Generate illustrations, manage media, and analyze your manuscript for quality.
Generate scene illustrations using AI image providers.
Media gallery for organizing all images associated with your story.
Cliché detector identifies overused patterns and suggests alternatives.
Full-featured experience on mobile and tablet devices.
Story list adapts cleanly to smaller screens.
The full editor experience works on mobile — write anywhere.
This repository serves as the community hub for CreativeWriter. Here you can:
- Report bugs you encounter in the hosted or self-hosted edition
- Request features you'd like to see added
- Join discussions about creative writing workflows, AI integration, and the app's future
The application source code lives in separate repositories (hosted is private; self-hosted is MIT).
Use the Issues tab to file structured reports:
- Report a Bug — Something isn't working as expected
- Request a Feature — Suggest an improvement or new capability
Have a question, idea, or just want to chat? Head to the Discussions tab.
| Link | |
|---|---|
| Hosted App | creativewriter.dev |
| Self-Hosted Edition | creativewriter-selfhosted |
| Self-Hosted Docker Deployment | Deployment Guide |
- Multi-Story Support: Manage multiple writing projects simultaneously
- Rich Text Editor: Full-featured ProseMirror-based editor with formatting tools and inline image support
- Story Structure: Organize your narrative with acts, chapters, scenes, and beats
- Auto-Save: Automatic saving with cross-device sync
- Images Within Text: Embed images directly within your story text for visual storytelling
- Multiple AI Providers: OpenRouter, Google Gemini, Claude, OpenAI-compatible, and Ollama (local LLMs)
- Image Generation: Integration with Replicate and fal.ai
- Real-time Streaming: Live text generation with streaming responses
- Beat AI Assistant: Intelligent suggestions for plot development with version history
- Scene Enhancement: AI-powered scene expansion and refinement
- Custom Prompts: Fine-tune AI behavior with customizable prompt templates
- Dynamic Knowledge Base: Track characters, locations, and plot elements
- Smart Context Awareness: AI understands your story's universe
- Relevance Scoring: Intelligent filtering of relevant codex entries for each scene
- Import/Export: Support for various formats, compatible with NovelCrafter exports
- PDF Export: Generate formatted PDFs of your stories
- Real-time Sync: Cross-device synchronization (hosted edition)
- Theme Support: Dark and light modes
- Custom Backgrounds: Upload and manage custom writing backgrounds
- Flexible Layouts: Adjustable editor and panel configurations
- Font Options: Multiple font choices for comfortable reading and writing
This project is proprietary software — see the LICENSE file for details. For the open-source community edition, see creativewriter-selfhosted (MIT License).
- Built with Angular and Ionic
- Rich text editing powered by ProseMirror
- Backend infrastructure by Supabase and Cloudflare
- AI integrations via OpenRouter, Google Gemini, Claude, and more
- Developed using AI-powered pair programming with Claude Code