NotebookLM is easily my favorite AI tool, and it has virtually no competition. But there are one or two contenders for its throne. Microsoft has its own answer to NotebookLM locked under a Copilot license, for one thing. And another project exists that's impressive, private and not owned by a big tech company. Enter Open Notebook.

NotebookLM is an "AI research tool" as Google calls it, but its flexibility lends itself to many names. It's great at breaking down complex topics into palatable and easy to understand information, making it perfect for school, work or creative brainstorming. To get started, you feed your sources, such as documents, plain text or web links. NotebookLM will analyze them and use the information to create Audio Overviews, flash cards and more. The best part is it will only generate output and responses based on your sources, so it's less likely to provide false information or give hallucinatory answers.

Open Notebook is a free open-source project by Luis Novo, and it can do a lot of what NotebookLM can do in a privacy-focused way. You can even run Open Notebook with a local AI model if you want, or choose from popular chatbot options like ChatGPT, Claude and others.

But one thing to note: The setup for Open Notebook is not for everyone. It can be especially tough for someone who is expecting to "sign in and go" like with NotebookLM. Unless you are already familiar with the requirements, of which there are many, you may find yourself hitting a wall before you even get to use Open Notebook. All that said, the fact that Open Notebook exists says a lot about NotebookLM itself and the desire for a more privacy-focused version of the product. What Open Notebook lacks in polish it makes up for in flexibility and features you simply do not (and likely will not) get with NotebookLM anytime soon.

The setup felt like a set up at times

I'm a self-described tinkerer, but the setup for Open Notebook threw me off a few times. You will need a program called Docker to set up a container and some Linux know-how to get things up and running. While I'm decent enough with Linux to break things, Docker and containers were new to me, and that was a sore point for this process.

If you are unfamiliar with setting up containers or Linux, this will probably be a challenge, even with the helpful get started guide. I still needed help from the developer to get everything up and running as it should. The hiccups you encounter may also be dependent on the operating system you want to run Open Notebook on. I was using Windows, but MacOS is apparently easier to get started with.

When everything is set up correctly, you can access Open Notebook though your web browser, just as you would with NotebookLM, although there is no mobile app equivalent. Then, you will need to set up the model you want to use. That was also an adventure for me, but the guide and the Open Notebook Discord community can be helpful if you, like me, get stuck.

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Open Notebook highlights

Open Notebook is for those looking for a more private and flexible NotebookLM alternative. Despite the speed of development from this Google offering, we can imagine some Open Notebook offerings will never land in NotebookLM for a variety of reasons.

Run local LLMs

NotebookLM is a cloud-based app like other Google products, which means your data is always being sent to a server and back to your computer. Open Notebook remedies this by allowing you to install local LLMs to use so your interactions are kept on a device. Not only does this increase data privacy, but since the entire AI model is installed on your device, you are not relying on the internet to get a reply.

Add sources to multiple notebooks

Sources are everything for tools such as NotebookLM and Open Notebook, and sometimes one source might belong in multiple notebooks. As of right now, sources in NotebookLM are strictly withheld to a single notebook, but Open Notebook allows you to choose what Notebooks you want to add a source to out of the gate. On the flipside, you can only add a single source at a time. Google brought the ability to add multiple sources at a time to NotebookLM earlier this year.

'Search and Ask' your knowledge base

Every time you add a source to Open Notebook, it becomes a part of your Knowledge Base, which transcends the bounds of any specific notebook you've created. You can also search your entire Knowledge Base for specific keywords, or "ask" your selected LLM questions based on your Knowledge Base sources.

Check out Transformations

You can think of Transformations as the text outputs from the NotebookLM Studio panel. You can choose options such as a dense summary, paper analysis, reflections, key insights and more. There is even a "Playground" option for you to try something out in a testing area before applying it fully to one of your sources.

Generate custom podcasts

Audio Overviews is one of the features that got NotebookLM lots of of well-deserved attention. Open Notebook has its own feature called podcasts that allows for more control. For instance, you can create separate speaker profiles and give them their own distinct personalities, but also have them run individually on separate LLMs to make for a dynamic podcast with different perspectives. If you are not interested in creating your own speaker, there are a handful of predefined speakers to choose from that you can use as is or duplicate and edit as you see fit.

We need a tool like Open Notebook

So much of our digital lives is constantly poured into the servers of big technology companies. So the ability to regain a degree of control of that, especially with such a powerful tool like Open Notebook, is a win. Whether privacy is your main concern or having more choices in AI models, Open Notebook will likely continue to get the attention it deserves and only grow from here.