From folder to conversation in seconds.
Drop your folder. Shelf does the rest.
Point Shelf at any folder on your Mac. It quietly indexes every document in the background — PDFs, Word files, Markdown notes, plain text — using on-device embeddings. No upload. No waiting. Just point and go.
Ask anything, in plain English.
Type a question the way you'd ask a colleague. Shelf finds the most relevant passages across all your documents and returns a grounded, cited answer. Not a list of files — an actual answer.
Every answer cites its source.
Shelf never makes things up without telling you. Every response links back to the exact document and passage it drew from. Click the citation and jump straight to that page.
Runs entirely on your Mac.
Your documents never leave your machine. Shelf uses Apple's on-device AI for embeddings and supports local LLMs via Ollama. Bring your own OpenAI or Anthropic key for higher-quality responses — or stay fully offline.
Two modes. One honest answer about each.
Use Ollama for fully local, air-gapped privacy — nothing leaves your Mac. Or bring your own OpenAI or Anthropic key for cloud-quality answers, where only the relevant passages for each query are sent — not your full documents.
NotebookLM is great.
Until your data is Google's.
Shelf does everything NotebookLM does — except upload your documents to a server. That's the whole point.
NotebookLM is a trademark of Google LLC. This comparison is based on publicly available information.
Ask a question.
Get an answer with a source.
Shelf reads your documents and answers questions in plain English — with a citation pointing to the exact page it drew from. No hallucinations without a source. No guessing.
Pay once. Use forever.
No subscriptions. No usage limits. No surprises. Buy it once and it's yours.
For individuals who want to try Shelf with a small document collection.
- ✓Up to 500 documents
- ✓Local LLM mode (Ollama)
- ✓PDF & plain text support
- ✓Basic chat interface
For power users who want unlimited access and the best AI quality.
- ✓Unlimited documents
- ✓Cloud LLM mode (BYOK)
- ✓All file types incl. Word & OCR
- ✓Source citation links
- ✓Quick Capture shortcut (⌘⇧Space)
- ✓Priority support
For small teams who want to share a document knowledge base.
- ✓Everything in Pro
- ✓Multiple Vaults
- ✓Shared folder support
- ✓Chat session export (MD/PDF)
- ✓Team licence (up to 5 seats)
Try Shelf. It's free.
Shelf is in open beta and free to download. If you work with documents that can't go to the cloud — contracts, reports, client files — this is built for you. Request access and help shape what comes next.
Access codes sent within 24 hours. No spam, ever.