A Notion alternative for project tracking: local, offline, one-time

The short answer

Stay with Notion if you share work with other people. Also stay if you want docs and databases in one place, or need your notes on every device. That's what Notion is built for.

Look at an alternative if:

• your projects are folders on your own computer, and the real status lives in files there;
• an AI assistant such as Claude Code or Codex does much of the work, and you don't want to copy its progress into another tool by hand;
• you want to work fully offline, or you'd rather pay once than keep paying for a subscription.

The rest of this page compares the two ways, fairly. It uses Notion's own prices and offline rules.

What Notion costs

Notion's pricing page lists these plans. Prices are per member, per month, in euros.

Notion says you save up to 20 percent if you pay by the year. Prices change. Check the page for your country and currency.

What "offline" means in Notion

Notion does work offline, with some limits. Here is what Notion's help page on offline use says:

• Offline works in the desktop and mobile apps. It does not work in a web browser.
• You mark pages yourself with "Available offline". On Plus, Business and Enterprise, pages you visited lately and your favourites also download by themselves.
• For a database, only the first 50 rows of the first view download.
• Pages inside a downloaded page don't download by themselves.
• Embeds, AI blocks, forms and buttons need a connection. You can't share pages or change their access rights while offline.
• Pages you download yourself are stored on that one device.

That's fine for reading and editing notes on a train. But it's not the same as data that lives on your own disk to begin with.

When Notion is the better choice

• You work with others. Shared pages, access rights and comments are what Notion does best.
• You want docs, wikis and databases together, with views, filters and links between them.
• You switch between devices, including phones and the web.
• You want AI inside your notes. The Business plan includes Notion's AI features.

A local tool for one PC doesn't try to do any of that.

When a local, file-based approach fits better

Do you run your projects with an AI coding assistant? Then its instructions already live in files in each project. Claude Code reads its instructions from CLAUDE.md, as the Claude Code docs explain. Codex reads them from AGENTS.md, as the Codex docs explain. Add one rule: "after meaningful work, update the status file". Then the assistant keeps a status file up to date in every project folder.

From then on, a separate tracker means typing the same status twice. A local tool that reads those files has three pluses:

• No double typing. The assistant updates the file. The overview reads it.
• Fully offline and private. The data never leaves your disk, because it was never anywhere else.
• No subscription. Plain files cost nothing, and a local tool can be a one-time purchase.

There are real downsides too. You can't share. There's no web access and no phone app. And it only covers projects that live on that one computer.

My experience

Notion has far more options than I use. I just wanted one screen that shows where each project stands, kept up to date by the work I do in Claude. So I built Project HQ.

Three ways to track projects without Notion

1. Plain files. Keep a STATUS.md or status.json in each project. Read them in your editor. It's free, and enough for two or three projects.
2. Instruction files plus a status rule. Tell Claude Code (in CLAUDE.md) or Codex (in AGENTS.md) to update the status file after meaningful work. Then the status stays up to date without you.
3. A dashboard that reads the files. Once you have more projects than you can keep in your head, a local dashboard shows them all on one screen. That's what Project HQ does. See below.

Notion vs a local project dashboard

Related reading

The guide to Claude Code's interfaces explains why session views don't show project status. The best practices guide covers keeping status in the project, not in the chat.