NAP product guide
How to use the Daily NAP Planner
The Daily NAP Planner asks how today actually is, then arranges what you were hoping to do around that answer rather than around an ideal day.
It runs in three steps — Notice, Adjust, Prioritize — and takes a few minutes. It is free, it needs no account, and by default everything you type stays in the browser you typed it in.
This guide covers only what the planner does today, including the parts people most often ask about: where the information lives, what the four groups mean, and what happens when you press delete.
Last reviewed 2026-08-28
Starting a day
Open the planner and it is already on today's date with an empty plan, or with whatever you last left in this browser. There is nothing to create and no day to open first.
- Open the planner. Step 1, the daily check-in, is showing.
- Answer the check-in as it is right now, not as you hoped it would be.
- Move to step 2 and add the things the day actually holds, including rest.
- Move to step 3 and read the day back in four groups, rearranging anything that looks wrong.
- Fill in the end-of-day reflection later if you want to — it is optional, and skipping it costs you nothing.
If you have saved day templates in My NAP, the top of the planner offers to start from one. That creates an editable copy for today and leaves the template itself untouched.
Step 1 — the daily check-in
The check-in is three short 1–5 scales, each written in plain words rather than numbers alone, plus a few optional extras. It is a self-description, not a measurement, and nothing about it is scored or graded.
| Field | What it asks | Required? |
|---|---|---|
| Physical energy | How the body is, on a 1–5 scale with descriptive wording | Yes |
| Mental clarity | How thinking and words are today, on the same 1–5 scale | Yes |
| Alertness | How close sleepiness is right now, on the same 1–5 scale | Yes |
| Hours slept | An approximate number, if you know it | No |
| Nap minutes | Time spent napping, if any | No |
| A note | Anything in your own words | No |
| Your own measures | Any custom 1–5 measures you created in My NAP, such as brain fog or pain | No |
Custom check-in measures are a complimentary Premium preview: they are built and open to everyone during the limited beta. You create them in My NAP, and they then appear in the check-in alongside the three core scales.
Step 2 — what the day holds
Step 2 is where you add tasks. Each item carries a small amount of structure so the planner can arrange the day sensibly, and every part of it stays editable.
- Title — whatever you would call it yourself.
- Priority — must, should or could.
- Effort — high-focus or light-lift, which matters more than length on a foggy day.
- Minutes — a rough estimate is fine.
- Fixed time — mark an item as fixed and give it a time if it genuinely cannot move.
- Category — optional, and drawn from the categories you keep in My NAP.
- Rest — an item can be rest rather than work: a nap, quiet rest, screen-free time, or a buffer between things.
Rest is an item on the plan in its own right. It is scheduled deliberately, it is not something to earn, and the planner does not treat it as the first thing to cut.
Custom task categories are a complimentary Premium preview, created and edited in My NAP. Personal planning rules — limits on high-focus work, buffers, recovery time after fixed commitments, and protected windows — are also a complimentary preview, and they change how step 3 arranges the day.
Step 3 — the day in four groups
Step 3 reads the day back to you. Instead of a single ordered list that implies everything will happen, the planner sorts what you added into four named groups and shows a short summary of the shape of the day.
| Group | What it means |
|---|---|
| Keep | Today's true essentials. If only these happen, the day counted. |
| Place Carefully | Important work that needs a better window than right now. |
| Flex | Tasks that can move if the day changes. |
| Postpone or Release | Things intentionally set aside without guilt. |
Alongside the groups you will see a planning ceiling in minutes and a number of high-focus slots. Both are derived from your own check-in and your own planning rules. They are guardrails you set, not a target to hit and not a judgement of what you managed.
- You can move any item between groups yourself, and reorder items inside a group.
- Once you rearrange something, the plan is marked as arranged by hand, and there is an undo control that returns it to the planner's own arrangement.
- An item that stays in Postpone or Release is not a failure and is not recorded as one. Nothing in NAP counts streaks, completion rates or missed tasks.
Low-energy mode
Low-energy mode is a single toggle in step 3, and it can be turned on or off at any point in the day. It shrinks the planning ceiling and the number of high-focus slots so the day becomes a much smaller shape, with the essentials kept and most other things pushed out.
It is free, it is not a preview of anything, and it is not a downgrade. If low-energy mode still feels like too much scaffolding, the Low-Energy Rescue Plan is a separate and simpler tool for a day that has already gone sideways.
The planner is a planning aid, and it never overrides rest, safety or medical needs. If the plan and your body disagree, the plan is the part that should change.
Reflection prompts
At the end of the planner there are four optional questions in your own words: what you completed, when your energy changed, what helped, and what tomorrow should account for. Nothing is scored and nothing is required. The answers are part of the day's plan and are stored exactly like the rest of it.
Where planner information is kept
This is the part worth reading slowly, because the planner has two separate places information can live and they do not mirror each other.
| In this browser | In your account | |
|---|---|---|
| How it gets there | Automatically, as you type | Only when you press "Save today to my account" |
| Account needed | No | Yes |
| Where it is | Local storage in the browser you are using | NAP's database, readable only by you |
| Across devices | No — it belongs to that browser on that device | Yes, when you are signed in |
| Removing it | "Delete my local planner data" on the planner page, or clearing your browser data | Delete your saved planning data, or your whole account, from account privacy settings |
- The browser copy is a single working day, not a history. Starting a new day replaces what was there.
- Saving to an account is always an explicit press. Nothing is uploaded quietly while you type.
- Saved days are listed together in your account, where you can open a past day.
- Deleting the local copy does not touch days you already saved to your account, and deleting saved days does not clear the browser copy. They are separate deletions.
Getting information in and out
- Export: a signed-in account can download everything NAP holds for it as a single JSON file from account privacy settings — saved plans, tasks, check-ins, reflections, your My NAP setup, journal and library entries, and your consent history. It is the same one export wherever you start it from.
- Import: bringing in a CSV or JSON file from elsewhere happens in Connected Insights, with a preview, validation, duplicate handling and undo. Safe import is a complimentary Premium preview and requires an account.
- Share card: the planner can draw a simple PNG of today's date and task titles in your browser, which you download and share yourself. Your check-in numbers, notes and reflection are never on it, and nothing is uploaded.
- Print: the planner has no dedicated print sheet today. If you want something on paper, the Low-Energy Rescue Plan and the NAP Quick Start Pack are both designed to print.
What the planner does not do
- It does not collect diagnosis, medication or any other clinical information, and it does not ask for it.
- It does not diagnose, monitor, measure or treat anything, and it makes no prediction about tomorrow.
- It does not know your calendar. Calendar-aware planning is recorded as planned work and does not exist today.
- It does not judge an unfinished day. There is no streak, no score, no completion rate and no reminder telling you that you fell behind.
- It does not post anywhere. The share card it can make is a PNG drawn in your browser that you send yourself if you want to.
What to do next
- Open the Daily NAP Planner
Free, no account, kept in this browser.
- Try the Low-Energy Rescue Plan
For a day that has already gone sideways.
- Set up My NAP
Your own categories, check-in measures, planning rules and day templates.
- See your saved plans
Days you chose to save. Sign-in required. Sign-in required.
- Tell NAP how the planner behaved
Product feedback.
Privacy and limitations
- Unless you press the save button while signed in, planner information stays in the browser you typed it in and is never sent to NAP.
- Browser-stored planning belongs to that browser. Clearing browser data removes it, and it does not appear on your other devices.
- On a shared or public computer, use the delete control on the planner page when you finish, or use a private window.
- Saving to an account and deleting the local copy are separate actions with separate effects.
- The planner is a planning aid. It does not diagnose, monitor, measure or treat anything, and an unfinished item is not a failure.