Charc Alpha v0.6. Features may shift, instability is possible, and the official beta is coming soon. Export your work often — one click, and we recommend it.
Free forever — works in your browser, no credit card, no trial.

Free your story.
Build your world.
Write your way.

Everything you need to write, plan, and share your work, in one place.

The Charc manuscript editor showing a chapter with custom art, a drop cap, the outline sidebar, and the daily writing goal bar
Charc's outline card view showing three acts of a novel as columns of color-coded scene cards
A character page in Charc's Ember theme with a portrait, appearance and personality fields, and a five-step character arc
Charc comparing a manuscript against a saved snapshot, with word-level insertions and deletions highlighted
Charc's page designer with an ornamental chapter heading and a live e-reader preview showing the finished chapter
Charc's progress dashboard showing word count stats, draft completion, current phase, and a book cover

A prose editor that gets out of the way

Clean, fast, and built for long-form — themes, chapter art, drop caps, and a focus mode that keeps your words front and center. Your drafts sync automatically.

Your whole story at a glance

Structure your manuscript into acts, chapters, and scenes — then flip the outline into a card board with color-coded scenes you can drag, retitle, and annotate in place. Zoom out until the entire book fits on one screen.

Sheets that feel like your book

Portraits, custom fields, freeform sections, and story arcs laid out step by step. Build character and setting pages from flexible blocks — and dress the whole workspace in themes that match the story you're telling.

Rewrite without fear

Save a snapshot before the big rewrite, then compare any version side by side with your working draft — every added and removed word highlighted, right in the manuscript.

Design the book, not just the manuscript

Lay out cover and front matter pages, drop decorative chapter headings into your chapters, and preview the result on a simulated e-reader before you export a pixel-perfect EPUB — or DOCX and PDF when it's time to submit.

Watch it take shape

Your cover, your word count, your phases and streaks — one dashboard that turns a half-written draft into something that already looks like a book.

Everything an author needs

From the first idea to the finished draft — your outline, your characters, your world, and your prose, all in one workspace.

A prose editor that gets out of the way

Clean, fast, and built for long-form. Beautiful themes, rich formatting, keyboard shortcuts, and a focus mode that keeps your words front and center. Your drafts sync automatically — you never lose a word.

Open the workspace

Reference panel

Pin images, notes, and manuscript snapshots alongside your prose as you write. Use it as a mood board, a compare view, or a research surface — your reference, always in reach.

Export anywhere. Write everywhere.

Export your manuscript to DOCX, PDF, or EPUB whenever you're ready. Your work syncs across devices automatically — your draft is wherever you are.

Collaboration

Invite co-authors and writing partners to your project. Share your manuscript with controlled access — set who can read and who can edit.

Built for authors of every kind

Novelists

From chapter one to the final draft. Charc gives you the structure to write the book you've been carrying around.

Screenwriters

Scene-based structure, act planning, and a clean editor that keeps your story moving forward.

Essayists

Long-form thinking deserves a long-form workspace. Research, outline, and write in one place.

Students

A serious tool that doesn't cost a thing. Charc is free forever — no trial, no credit card.

Everything is open right now.

Charc is in alpha, and nothing in it is gated. The complete editor, the book designer, covers and front matter, collaboration, and every export — all of it, with no trial clock and no card.

Now, in alpha
All of it, free. Every feature is unlocked for every account while the alpha runs.
When beta opens
Getting your manuscript out stays free. DOCX, TXT and HTML always, plus a clean single-column PDF on a standard template — your words are never held hostage, in any format. What becomes paid is the designed book: Charc’s page layout and typography, chapter openers, images set on the page, trim sizes and margins. That is the Publish plan, $59 a year.

Billing opens with the beta, not before. Accounts created during the alpha keep the designed-book features for a period after that, counted from the day the account was made.

Built in the open

Charc is in active development. Here's an honest look at where things stand.

Already here

Shipped

  • Prose editor with a true page view and themes
  • Outline board that is the manuscript
  • Characters & world-building, pinned beside the prose
  • Book design: front matter, print covers, DOCX / PDF / EPUB
  • Screenplay mode with Fountain export
  • Collaboration with roles and scene locks
Everything else, release by release
In progress

Building now 🔨

  • Front matter & cover designer
  • Charts & timelines
  • Design element library
  • Manuscript health report
On the horizon

Coming soon 🔭

  • Desktop app (offline + sync)
  • Native mobile apps
  • Translated interface (UI in your language)
  • Fountain screenplay import
  • Optional integrations with outside tools

Go deeper

Best Practices for Writing in Charc

Ten habits that make the workspace disappear — snapshots, living outlines, reference rituals, and backups for peace of mind.

Read

Outlining methods that work for discovery writers too

Headlights, wakes, landmarks, and question outlines — structure without killing the discovery.

Read

Charc vs. Scrivener: an honest comparison

Feature by feature against the twenty-year incumbent — including where Scrivener is still the better choice.

Read

All articles

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