Find out, free. Then learn to put ten more on your own body, and see tomorrow which list stayed.
Try the free lessonNo account needed.
The first lesson
Tomorrow both lists come back as a short check, on this phone or by email, so you can see what stayed.
Try the free lessonThe method
You already know the order of your own body, feet first and head last. The method uses that order. To remember a list, you put one thing on each part of your body by writing a short scene where the thing does something to it.
The ANCHOR smashes down onto your feet.
To recall the list, you start at your feet and work up, asking what’s on each part. When something comes back, its place lights up.
Make the word do something to the place: crush it, soak it, tickle it. If you can see or feel it, good; if not, the words still work. In the study our first lesson is based on, how vividly people could imagine things made no difference.
From the first lesson. Ten parts, nothing to set up, and it goes with you into the exam hall or the meeting.
The way to work, your street, the walk to the station. A route runs one way, and its landmarks don’t repeat.
Your home, your office, the gym, in the order you walk through them, drawn as a map of your own.
People have used places this way for more than two thousand years. A Roman handbook for speakers, the Rhetorica ad Herennium, describes the method in the 80s BC. It tells students to mark every fifth place with a golden hand.
On this page the hand is plain line. In Without Notes, gold means one thing only: you remembered.
After today
Two scores, one each way: the same time per word and the same test, with each round’s time beside its score. Then, if you like, five of your own things on a walk you know.
Both lists come back by email as a short check, at the time of day you pick. Nothing on screen helps you.
One more check, with nothing on screen to help you.
Both lists once more, a month on, if you say yes.
Every number says how it was made: from memory, on which day, after how many walks. No streak, no daily goal.
With full access
Once a scene comes back from memory, you see it drawn: your own sentence, as a picture, on every phone or computer you sign in on. Up to 10 a month.
The TEAPOT lands on the vending machine.
The ROCKET crashes through your knees.
The UMBRELLA snaps open and jams the photocopier.Examples. Each is an AI illustration of the sentence under it, drawn in the app’s own style. Only the sentence goes to OpenAI, which draws it; for people 18 and over who switch it on.
Your own material
Anything you need to remember: points, numbers, words, names. Paste it or type it after the first lesson, and Without Notes suggests a way for each, with a line on why. The suggestion comes from a set of fixed rules, not an AI.
Places, and cards
Your topic list or the steps of a process go on places, in order. Terms and definitions become cards that ask before they show.
Places, in order
One key word for each point in your outline, one point to a place, so the whole talk has an order you can walk.
Places, and number cards
Your opening, your reasons and your answers to the objections you expect, in order. Numbers are harder, so each figure gets a card of its own.
Cards, both ways
Product lines, key specs and the objections you hear every week, checked from the question to the answer and back.
Cards, both ways
Your own word list, asked both ways: one now, the other in tomorrow’s check.
The people list
A name and a short note on who they are. Say it once, link it to something, then see the note and type the name. Names get a list of their own instead of a place on your body.
It helps less with skills you have to perform and with things you’d look up anyway. It won’t improve your memory in general. It keeps what you put in it.
Evidence
The first lesson gives you two scores, one each way, with the same time per word and the same test, and each round’s time beside its score. Tomorrow’s check shows what’s left of both lists a day later. Every number Without Notes shows you comes from your own lists, and says how many walks you’ve had.
We won’t promise a photographic memory or a better brain, and we won’t quote a percentage from someone else’s study. Once enough people have taken the test, including a group that takes the first round twice before learning the method, we’ll publish the combined results here, along with how we got them.
Ten parts of the body, typed from feet to head, worked as well as a classical memory palace for recalling a list in order.
Kluger and colleagues, 2022, 221 people, repeated with 147 more
Recalling something before you look at it again is one of the best-supported ways to learn.
Yang and colleagues, 2021, a review of 222 classroom studies
Spreading those recalls over several days works better than packing them into one sitting.
Mawson and Kang, 2025, a review of 22 classroom studies
At a real social event, practising recall of names beat a picture trick.
The memory palace on its own has less evidence behind it than its fans suggest. For young adults the measured advantage is small and uncertain.
Ondřej, 2025, a review of 85 experiments
That’s why every walk in Without Notes asks you to recall before it shows you anything, and why the checks are spread over days.
Price
In the one- and two-star reviews of memory apps, billing is the most common complaint. So here are our rules, in full.
$0
Every tool, up to 10 of your own things, and every walk and check, for good.
$49.99 a year
Renews each year until you cancel. Or $14.99 for 90 days, paid once: it never renews. €49.99 or €14.99 in the EU, VAT included.
On sale now. Take the free first lesson, and you can buy full access from your lessons page whenever you’re ready.
Questions
The first lesson is free, and so is every tool: places on your body, cards, both ways and the people list, for up to 10 of your own things and 15 names. Every walk, check and export stays free for good. Paying once removes the limits.
Not for the first lesson, and not for tomorrow’s check: it opens on this phone. At the end of the lesson you can give your email to get the check by email, and then sign in on any device.
You don’t need to. In the study our first lesson is based on, how vividly people could imagine things made no difference. The instruction is to make the word do something to the place, and you write that as a sentence.
No. It’s for the specific things you put in it: a list, a talk, your exam topics, the names from a meeting. It isn’t brain training.
We’ll tell you once we’ve measured it with enough people, and not before. If the words come too fast, you can ask for more time per word, and both rounds get the same slower pace.
A memory palace is a set of places you know, in a fixed order, used to hold things you want to remember in that order. People have used rooms and streets this way for more than two thousand years. Without Notes starts with your body because it needs no setup, and a 2022 study found ten parts of the body worked as well as a classical memory palace. After the first lesson, a walk you know, your own rooms or a drawn room can hold the next things.
Anything with an order or a fixed list: exam topics, the points of a talk, the steps of a process, answers to objections, product lines, a set of words. It helps less with skills you have to perform, and with things you’d look up anyway.
Names work differently. At a real social event, practising recall of names beat a picture trick (Morris and colleagues, 2005). So names don’t go on your body. You add a name with a short note, then you see the note and type the name, at growing gaps.
Full access is $49.99 a year or $14.99 for 90 days (€49.99 or €14.99 in the EU, VAT included; in the US, sales tax is added where it applies). The year renews each year until you cancel: we email you 35 and 7 days before each renewal, and one tap cancels it. The 90 days is paid once, never renews, and simply ends. If you change your mind within 14 days, you get the full amount back. Anything you’ve placed stays yours to walk, check and export, whether you pay or not.
What you add and your scenes are stored so we can bring them back for your checks. We never sell them, and we never use them to train AI models.
Yes. The places and the figure are made with image models under a written style guide, and a person chooses each one before it’s used. The stars, the lines and everything that shows what you remembered are drawn in code.
Without Notes runs in your phone’s browser. Versions for the app stores come later.
If you’ve noticed changes in your memory that worry you, please talk to a doctor first. Without Notes is a study tool, and it can’t diagnose or treat anything. It’s made for keeping a list or a talk in your head, at any age.
One independent developer.