EssentAI

Spend less time searching back through papers

A literature review means reading dozens of articles and then trying to find the one passage you remember from three weeks ago. EssentAI is a desktop application for Windows and macOS that keeps your literature organised and puts the key information from each article in front of you, so you can spend your time reading and writing.

Who it is for

EssentAI is built for anyone writing a literature review: honours, masters and doctoral students, academics preparing journal articles and researchers working on reports or grant applications. It works in any discipline. Nothing in the app assumes a particular field of study.

How it works

1. Create a project for your thesis, paper or research question. Each project keeps its own collection of articles, and the All view lets you reuse an article in a new project without importing it again.

2. Find articles with the built in search, which queries academic sources from inside the app. You can filter by date range, broaden a search with AI when you are exploring a new area and save searches to reopen later.

3. Add a PDF and EssentAI extracts the title, reference, summary, research gap, research problem, theories and frameworks, key constructs, methodology and key findings into a single Article Details card. You can judge whether an article is relevant before you commit time to reading it in full.

4. Track your progress with status labels such as To read, Reading, Key article, Seminal work, Use in writing and Exclude.

5. Take notes by highlighting text and sending it to a themed notebook. A citation is added automatically in your chosen style, including APA 7 and Harvard.

6. Synthesise across your library with the synthesis matrix, get citation recommendations drawn from articles you have already reviewed and paraphrase selected text as you write.

7. Export references in RIS format for use with your reference manager.

Your library stays on your device

EssentAI is local first. Your projects, article records and notes are stored on your own computer. The AI features use the OpenAI API with your own API key, which is stored on your device. When you use an AI feature, the relevant text is sent from your computer to OpenAI under your own account. EssentAI does not route your library through its own servers. Search, AI features and subscription checks need an internet connection.

What it does not do

EssentAI does not replace critical reading or scholarly judgement. It helps you organise your sources and find information quickly, so you can make better decisions about what to read closely and how the literature fits together.

Pricing

EssentAI uses a subscription for the app, with a short free trial. AI usage is billed separately by OpenAI to your own account, so you decide how much credit to add and when.