Getting Started with TiddlyWiki in 2026 (featuring encryption & TiddlyDesktop)
Updated  by  nm  2026-May-3

Why I’m trying TiddlyWiki

For a long time, I’ve been looking for good knowledge and document management tools. Inspired by a comment on this Infinite Ink article, the 2026-April-20 release of TiddlyWiki v5.4.0, and TiddlyWiki’s built-in encryption, I’m trying TiddlyWiki (TW).¹

About this article

I’ve had a hard time grokking TW and I’m writing this article to help me remember how to set it up on all my devices. I hope it will be useful to others too. To learn about TW, see…

• wikipedia.org/wiki/TiddlyWiki,
• tiddlywiki.com,
• and the TiddlyWiki discussion groups listed below.

Terminology

TW

Abbreviation for TiddlyWiki.

TiddlyWiki Edition (sometimes known as a Template)

Collection of plugins, components, and sample content to get you up and running with TW. An example of a TW edition is empty.html, which we use below. See tiddlywiki.com/#Editions or tiddlywiki.com/static/Editions.html.

TiddlyDesktop Main Window

Window that lists registered wikis and their paths. The title of this window can be changed by clicking the Settings button at the top of this main window: Settings > Wiki List Window Title

Tiddler

Fundamental unit of information in TW. See tiddlywiki.com/#Tiddlers or tiddlywiki.com/static/Tiddlers.html.

NW

On some operating systems, nw is the name of the TiddlyDesktop app. For example, on Windows, TiddlyDesktop is launched with nw.exe. NW.js is an application runtime that was formerly known as node-webkit. For details, see nwjs.io.

Download and replicate empty.html

Empty.html is a vanilla TW edition with no additional plugins or configuration beyond the core code.

1. Use a web browser to go to tiddlywiki.com/#Empty%20Edition.
2. In the second bullet, select the green Download button.
3. Save empty.html to your Downloads folder.
4. Make two copies of empty.html named:
   • my-wiki.html (this is where you will work)
   • empty-original.html (do not edit this)
5. Open empty.html in a text editor (e.g., Notepad, Vim, or Visual Studio Code) and note that line 173 looks like this:

   <!--~~ Ordinary tiddlers ~~-->
   

6. Close empty.html without saving it. If you mess it up, you have empty-original.html as a backup, thanks to Step 4.

Download TiddlyDesktop

7. In a web browser, go to github.com/TiddlyWiki/TiddlyDesktop/releases.
8. In the top release (v0.0.22 at the moment) in the Assets section, click the appropriate release for your system. On my Windows devices, I click tiddlydesktop-win64-v0.0.22.zip.
9. Go to your Downloads folder and unzip the .zip file you downloaded in the Step 8.

Launch TiddlyDesktop

10. In the uzipped folder that was created in Step 9, launch TiddlyDesktop. On my Windows devices, I do this by double clicking nw.exe. (Note that nw means node-webkit.)

Open my-wiki.html

11. In the TiddlyDesktop Main window, click the button named Add wiki file.
12. In the file-manager prompt, find and select my-wiki.html, which we created in Step 4.
13. This launches a new window titled My TiddlyWiki – a non-linear personal web notebook
14. The sidebar of this window contains tools for managing this wiki.
15. To create a new tiddler, click + in the sidebar.
16. This creates a draft tiddler titled New Tiddler.
17. in the text box that says Type the text for this tiddler, type Hello World!.
18. Notice that in the sidebar there is a red bullseye🎯.
19. To save your changes, click the red bullseye. A little window pops up and displays Saved wiki.
20. When you are done drafting this tiddler, click the checkmark above the tiddler. Notice that when you hover over this checkmark, it displays Confirm changes to this tiddler.
21. To edit this tiddler again, click the pencil above the tiddler.

Be sure your my-wiki.html changes are saved

22. Close all TiddlyDesktop windows that are open.
23. (Optional) restart your device.
24. Launch TiddlyDesktop (on Windows it is named nw.exe).
25. In the TiddlyDesktop Main window, you should see your wiki listed.
26. To open it, click the open button.
27. In the sidebar, click the Recent tab and make sure all the changes you made were saved.

Encrypt my-wiki.html

A big part of why I’m interested in TW is that it has built-in encryption.

28. In the sidebar, select the Tools tab.
29. Check the set password checkbox. This will display a lock in the page toolbar.
30. Click the set password button and in the pop-up window, set a password. Do not forget your password!
31. Notice that set password button now says clear password.
32. Click the 🎯save changes button, which is below the password button in the list of tools.
33. Open my-wiki.html in a text editor (e.g., Notepad, Vim, or Visual Studio Code) and note that the line we looked at in Step 5 has a new line below it:

    <!--~~ Ordinary tiddlers ~~-->
    <!--~~ Encrypted tiddlers ~~-->
    

    This is a way to check that my-wiki.html is in fact encrypted.🔒
34. Close this wiki’s window by clicking the X in the upper right of the window.
35. Use the TiddlyDesktop Main window to reopen my-wiki.html. Make sure you are prompted for a password and that you remember your password.

TiddlyWiki discussion groups

• talk.tiddlywiki.org
• github.com/TiddlyWiki/TiddlyWiki5/discussions
• github.com/TiddlyWiki/TiddlyWiki5/issues
• old.reddit.com/r/TiddlyWiki5
• groups.google.com/g/tiddlywiki

Endnote