Only the time you spend looking counts

Memoir times what’s in front of you, and stops when you look away. Here’s exactly what counts, when the clock stops, and what’s kept.

What counts

The tab you’re looking at, in the browser window that’s in front. Other tabs, and windows behind other apps, don’t count, even if a video is playing in them.
Every kind of tab. Websites count under their name, like youtube.com. Tabs that aren’t websites count under one name each: Memoir itself, New Tab, Browser pages (Settings, History, Downloads and the like), Extensions and Files you open from your computer.
By the hour. Each day keeps how long you spent on each site, and in which hours, so the report can show your day hour by hour.

When the clock stops

Another app is in front, or the browser is minimised.
You haven’t touched the mouse or keyboard for 60 seconds. If the tab is playing sound, like a video or music, it keeps counting.
The screen locks, or the computer goes to sleep. After a long silence, at most a minute is counted.
You pause it with Track browsing in Settings.

Private time

Sites on your Never track list still count towards your total and your limit, and among the categories as Other, but with no names: a day or an hour shows it as one Private line. Adding a site makes its past time Private too. Private (Incognito) windows count the same way, if you let Memoir run in them.

What’s kept

Each site’s name and its time, hour by hour. Never what you type, click or read.
Page titles and their links, only if you turn them on in Settings: every page each day, and after a week a site’s 30 with the most time, the rest as “other pages”.
Everything is kept for as long as you choose under Keep history (forever, unless you pick a shorter time).

Where it’s kept

In your browser, on your computer, in its own storage for extensions. That’s in your profile’s folder, the Profile Path that chrome://version shows, under Local Extension Settings, in the folder named with the letters after chrome-extension:// in the report’s address.
In Chrome on Windows that’s %LOCALAPPDATA%\Google\Chrome\User Data\Default\Local Extension Settings, and on a Mac ~/Library/Application Support/Google/Chrome/Default/Local Extension Settings. Another profile has its own folder in place of Default, like Profile 1.
It isn’t synced to your Google account or your other devices. Those files are the browser’s own database, for Memoir to read: Export in Settings, under Your data, saves a copy you can keep or move.
In Memoir for Windows too, if you link the two: it keeps its own copy in its Data folder, %LOCALAPPDATA%\Programs\Memoir\Data.
Nowhere else: no server, no account. Removing Memoir from the browser deletes what it kept there. More in the privacy policy.

Linked with Memoir for Windows

Optional. Press Link in Settings, under Your data, and your browser and Memoir for Windows show the same week. You choose to merge both histories, or to start from today.
Both keep counting. Each keeps the other’s days apart from its own and shows the two merged: where both counted the same hour, the larger time counts, never the two added together.
Apps and Browsers. Memoir for Windows counts your browser as an app, with all its time, and Memoir in the browser counts the sites in it: the same minutes, seen two ways. Most used shows them as two lists, Apps and Browsers; your totals, your limit, your categories and your hours count each minute once.
Your Windows apps show in the report too, by name, icon and category, and Memoir for Windows shows your sites with their own icons.
One set of rules. Never track, Page titles, Keep history, the weekly reminder, your daily limit, categories, pausing and Appearance (the theme, the cursor and the Rainbow clock) follow whichever side changed them last.
While Memoir for Windows is open, it sends the limit and weekly notifications, so each comes once.
A newer Memoir for Windows. The extension knows the newest one, and tells a linked Memoir for Windows; an older one then says so in its Settings, with a link to this website. Neither looks online.
Unlink from either side and both keep what they have. While linked, Clear all on either side clears both.
It runs through your browser’s native messaging and a named pipe only your Windows account can open: on this computer, never online.

Your daily limit

The ring is green, then yellow at 75% of your limit, orange at 90% and red at 95%, when you get a notification. Past the limit it turns deep red with a flame, and you’re notified once more.
Once you commit to a limit, it’s locked: it stays the same on the days after. Only Settings can undo it, after a run of questions.

Light on your browser

Nothing runs inside the pages you visit. Memoir asks the browser which tab is in front, so it never slows a website down or sees what’s on it.
Its background part works when you switch tabs or windows, and saves once a minute. The report and the toolbar popup run only while they’re open.

Closing the report

Pull the gear at the top right down and let go to close the report’s tab. Leave the mouse by the gear for a moment and it shows you how. A click still opens Settings.

Why it may differ from other screen-time tools

Your phone’s or your computer’s own screen time counts every app, and any time the screen is on. Memoir counts only the browser, and only while you’re using it. So its numbers are usually smaller, and they tell you where your browsing went.

The clock is real

Memoir’s clock tells the time: the dot goes round the ring once a minute, the long hand shows the minutes and the short hand the hours, on your computer’s own time. Like the one at the top of this page.

What counts

The app you’re using, in the window that’s in front. Apps behind it don’t count, even if a video is playing in them.
Websites, under their name, like youtube.com, in Chrome, Edge, Firefox, Brave, Opera, Vivaldi, Arc and Comet. Memoir reads the site’s name from the browser’s address bar, or from Memoir in that browser once you link them; until it can, the time counts under the browser.
A browser is an app too, with all its time, and the websites in it count as well: they’re the same minutes, seen two ways. Most used shows them as two lists, Apps and Browsers. Your totals, your limit, your categories and your hours count each minute once.
Memoir itself, as Memoir. The desktop and the taskbar don’t count.
By the hour. Each day keeps how long you spent in each app and on each site, and in which hours, so the report can show your day hour by hour.

When the clock stops

You haven’t touched the mouse or keyboard for 60 seconds. If the app in front is playing sound, like a video or music, it keeps counting.
The screen locks, or the computer goes to sleep.
You pause it with Track screen time in Settings, or Pause in Memoir’s menu in the notification area.
You quit Memoir. Closing or minimising its window doesn’t stop it: it keeps counting from the notification area.

Starting with Windows

Memoir starts when you sign in to Windows, straight into the notification area, without opening its window, so a restart doesn’t leave a gap in your day.
Memoir is in your Start menu: type its name in Windows Search to open it.
Turn off Start with Windows in Settings, or Memoir in Windows’ own Startup apps, and it starts only when you open it. Either switch turns it back on.
If tracking is paused, Memoir still starts, but paused: nothing counts until you resume it, from Settings, Today or its menu in the notification area.

Installing and uninstalling

Memoir Setup installs Memoir for your Windows account in a moment, with no questions and no administrator, and opens it when it’s done. A newer Memoir Setup updates it, and your history stays.
A newer version. Memoir never looks online, but Memoir in a linked browser knows the newest Memoir for Windows: when it’s newer than yours, Settings says so, with a link to this website, until you have it.
To remove it, find Memoir in Windows’ Settings, under Apps, and choose Uninstall. It asks once, and you can keep your history for if you come back; everything else it put on your computer goes with it.

Its window

No title bar. Drag the top of the page to move the window, and double-click there to maximise it.
Pull the gear down and let go to close the window, or press Alt+F4. Memoir keeps counting in the notification area. Leave the mouse by the gear for a moment and it shows you how.
Pull it up for full screen, or press F11. Do it again to come back.

The clock in the notification area

Click it for Today, right beside it: your day so far, the same view Memoir shows from your browser’s toolbar. Its close button, a click anywhere else and Esc all close it.
Right-click it for Memoir’s menu: open Memoir, Today, pause or resume tracking, or quit.
Double-click it to open Memoir. Resting the mouse on it shows how much time you’ve spent today.

Private time

Apps and websites on your Never track list still count towards your total and your limit, and among the categories as Other, but with no names: a day or an hour shows it as one Private line. Adding one makes its past time Private too. Private (Incognito) browser windows count as Private only with Memoir linked in that browser, allowed to run in them; without it, Memoir can’t tell a private window from any other.

What’s kept

Each app’s and site’s name and its time, hour by hour, and each app’s icon. Never what you type, click or see.
Page and window titles, only if you turn on Page titles in Settings: every one each day, and after a week an app’s or site’s 30 with the most time, the rest as “other pages”.
Everything is kept for as long as you choose under Keep history (forever, unless you pick a shorter time).
Sites show their own icons once a browser is linked; it passes them on from its own icon cache.

Where it’s kept

In the Data folder next to Memoir: %LOCALAPPDATA%\Programs\Memoir\Data, where Memoir Setup puts it. Paste that into File Explorer’s address bar to open it.
history.json holds your history and your settings, and history.json.backup the save before it, in case one is ever cut short. icons holds your apps’ and sites’ icons, and WebView the cache of Memoir’s window and Today, like a browser’s.
In each browser you link, Memoir there keeps its own copy, in that browser’s storage for extensions.
Nowhere else: no server, no account. Uninstalling deletes the Data folder, unless you choose to keep your history. More in the privacy policy.

Linked with Memoir in your browser

Optional. Add Memoir to Chrome, Edge, Brave, Opera, Vivaldi, Arc or another browser built on Chromium, and press Link in its Settings, under Your data: that browser and Memoir for Windows show the same week. You choose to merge both histories, or to start from today.
Both keep counting. Each keeps the other’s days apart from its own and shows the two merged: where both counted the same hour, the larger time counts, never the two added together.
Every browser you use. Link each one: Memoir passes each one’s time on to the others, and its Settings show a row for each.
One set of rules. Never track, Page titles, Keep history, the weekly reminder, your daily limit, categories, pausing and Appearance (the theme, the cursor and the Rainbow clock) follow whichever side changed them last.
While Memoir for Windows is open, it sends the limit and weekly notifications, so each comes once.
Unlink from either side and both keep what they have. While linked, Clear all on either side clears both.
It runs through your browser’s native messaging and a named pipe only your Windows account can open: on this computer, never online.

Your daily limit

The ring is green, then yellow at 75% of your limit, orange at 90% and red at 95%, when you get a notification. Past the limit it turns deep red with a flame, and you’re notified once more.
Once you commit to a limit, it’s locked: it stays the same on the days after. Only Settings can undo it, after a run of questions.

Light on your computer

About 10 MB of memory while Memoir runs in the notification area, the figure Task Manager shows, even with a year of history. Less than a single browser tab.
Under 1% of one processor core, on average: it looks at the app in front once a second and saves every half minute, and does nothing else.
Its window and Today are pages, like a browser’s, so they use more while they’re open. Close them and all of that is let go.
Linked with a browser, Memoir adds a small bridge to it: a second Memoir in Task Manager, about 9 MB, that closes with the browser.

Why it may differ from other screen-time tools

Windows and other screen-time tools often count any time the screen is on. Memoir counts only while you’re using your computer, or while the app in front plays sound. So its numbers are usually smaller, and they tell you where your time went.