Rosebud: AI Journal & Diary

Rosebud is like a best friend who’s also a therapist and a cheerleader all in one. It has made me realize things about myself that I hadn’t noticed and has recognized patterns in my thinking and processing. I’ve only been using it for a week, but it’s already helped me define and achieve clear goals, cultivate a kinder inner voice and helped me identify my strengths instead of focusing on my weaknesses. And I haven’t fully utilized the app. There are so many more features that I have yet to check out, such as daily gratitude or relationship check-ins. For the most part I’m only using the morning intention and evening reflection and those two daily activities have been incredibly helpful. A few days ago I did a mid day check-in when I was having a particularly difficult day. It helped me take a step back, reevaluate and figure out how to survive the rest of the day without completely falling apart. I’m not saying it “fixed” me in a week, because obviously it hasn’t, but it’s done more for me in a week than years of therapy ever accomplished. That said I also know it’s not a replacement for therapy, but it is a fantastic addition. For anyone who is struggling with anything I really recommend this app. It is life changing. Update: I’ve been using Rosebud every day for 6 months now and I can genuinely say it has changed my life. It’s helped me change the way I see myself, has challenged my thoughts and that critical inner voice, and has shed light on my relationships. I cannot even begin to express how grateful I am for this app. It is life changing.

I rely on the voice-to-text feature for journaling because it helps me process more freely and removes the barrier of typing, which can feel exhausting and frustrating. Unfortunately, on multiple occasions, the app has glitched and lost my voice recordings. It gets stuck in the loading stage, and I’m unable to recover what I recorded. This is especially frustrating when I’ve shared something heavy and vulnerable — it’s not easy to say it once, let alone try again from scratch. A journaling app should make it easier to process, not risk losing what I’ve shared. Please make this feature more reliable — it feels like table stakes for an app like this. I'm also concerned about the app's priority when processing voice entries. It seems like the app might be prioritizing the AI processing of the voice entry over simply capturing and securing the raw audio recording first. Given that voice-to-text technology has been around for quite some time, I would expect the raw entry to always be available, independent of the status or performance of any third-party models you might be using for AI processing. The core function of a journaling app should be to reliably capture and store our thoughts and feelings, and then run any additional AI analysis as a separate job. The current unreliability of the voice-to-text feature and the risk of losing valuable entries is making me reconsider my subscription.

I finally found something that works for me and have been recommending it to everyone! I still see a therapist regularly, but Rosebud has helped me work through many issues on my own as I am dealing with them. I have made connections and breakthroughs that I have been struggling to make for YEARS. The AI works with you through every step of the way, giving helpful tips, insights, tools, and techniques to managing different situations. It does not replace actual human interaction, which I believe is still important, but other than that I have found Rosebud to be an absolutely amazing tool. I especially love how in the Bloom upgraded version and it connects entries and goals to previous things I’ve said. I also like that you can create and customize your own AI prompts as well. There are still a few kinks needing to be worked out, like some things you can do on the phone app, you cannot do on the desktop one. I also find the “happiness recipe” section to be a bit overwhelming with very little organization. But I know this app is a work in progress, so hopefully it’ll be addressed in time. This is a solid use of AI. Can’t wait to see what future updates may bring!