EU Sovereignty Score
Self-hosted / open sourceNotes & TasksHeadquarters: CA

Resurf: sovereignty score and 8 European alternatives

Resurf is a local-first knowledge library for Mac, iPhone and iPad in which you save and search notes, links, images, PDFs, voice memos and files. A Chrome extension captures web content. The data stays on your own devices; syncing through iCloud is optional and takes place in your own private iCloud account at Apple. AI features are off by default and use your own OpenAI API key, so content goes directly from your device to OpenAI. On iPhone, voice notes can also be transcribed on the device itself. Resurf is proprietary software sold with a one-time licence.

The vendor operates from Canada, and its terms are governed by the laws of Quebec and Canada. No parent company is known. According to the privacy policy, the vendor has no access to your content. Anonymous usage analytics through PostHog are on by default and can be switched off. Payments are handled by Polar, and the licence key is validated online once. The policy addresses the GDPR and offers deletion of your email address on request.

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Sovereignty score
63 / 1000 = high exposure
100 = sovereign
  • Jurisdiction SOV-250
    Headquartered outside the EU (CA)
  • Data residency SOV-3100
    No hosting in Europe (OTHER)
  • Cryptographic key sovereignty SOV-380
    Closed source, but self-hostable: encryption keys and runtime under your own control
  • Freedom from lock-in SOV-640
    Closed source: switching requires data migration
  • Source & runtime sovereignty SOV-4 · SOV-645
    Closed source, but self-hostable on your own infrastructure

SOV codes: the matching objective in the European Commission's Cloud Sovereignty Framework. Official source

How the score is calculated

Facts and evidence

Last checked October 13, 2026
Headquarters
CA (OTHER)Verified by hand
EU adequacy decision
Yes — found adequate by the European CommissionVerified by hand
Data hosting
Self-hosted, e.g. in OTHER (your choice)Verified by hand
Open-source
NoVerified by hand
GDPR-compliant
YesVendor-stated
Category
Notes & Tasks
Type
Product
Website
resurf.so ↗

How we verify · Something wrong? Suggest a correction

Top EU-based & GDPR-compliant alternatives to Resurf

The European alternatives to Resurf come from our knowledge base of over 8,000 vendors. We only list vendors headquartered in the EU or the EEA; fully European-owned vendors rank before vendors with a foreign owner. For each alternative you see the country, the open-source status and a short description.

Score per alternative: 0 = high exposure, 100 = sovereign

27 European Notes & Tasks vendors are in the catalogue. View the whole category · Submit an alternative · View category on the map

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Why digital sovereignty matters with Resurf

Resurf is headquartered in CA, outside the EU. Contracts and data therefore also fall under non-European law. The GDPR applies through contractual terms, but in a conflict with local legislation you have less certainty than with a European vendor.

Resurf runs on infrastructure you choose and control yourself. You decide where the data lives, including fully within the EU if you want — this is not a fixed hosting choice made by the vendor.

Resurf is closed source, but you run the software yourself on your own infrastructure. The encryption keys and the runtime therefore stay under your own control, though you cannot audit or modify the source code. Ask about export options and open standards to limit software-level lock-in.

What this means for your organisation depends on your whole stack and context. The free assessment weighs Resurf together with your other vendors and gives a total score, a heatmap and the main risk drivers.

Frequently asked questions

What is the best European alternative to Resurf?

It depends on your use case. Strong EU alternatives to Resurf include Amie, Anytype and Bear. On this page you can compare 8 EU alternatives by jurisdiction, data residency and open-source status.

Are there open-source alternatives to Resurf?

Yes. Open-source EU alternatives to Resurf include Carnet, CryptPad and HedgeDoc. These keep your data fully under your own control and let you self-host if you want to.

Is Resurf GDPR-compliant and where is the data hosted?

Resurf is headquartered in CA (OTHER) and hosts data in OTHER. The vendor states it is GDPR-compliant, but the data falls under non-EU jurisdiction. For full EU data residency the EU alternatives on this page usually offer more certainty.

Details and sources

Verified by handHeadquarters, owner, hosting locations and licence have been checked by us against public sources. Free of charge and for every vendor, not a paid label. Nothing in this knowledge base is taken over automatically. Last checked on October 13, 2026.

Sources

Public sources used in the latest check of this record.

Compliance evidence

The links below point to the vendor's own public documents. We only record what we found: a missing link means "not found publicly", not "not compliant".

No public compliance evidence has been recorded for this vendor yet. Do you know its DPA or subprocessor list? Something wrong? Suggest a correction

In the changelog

Earlier changes to this page, as listed in the public changelog.

Digital sovereignty in Notes & Tasks

Notes & Tasks: Note-taking apps and task management — write, organise, sync. In this category the choice of vendor determines who has legal access to your data, where that data lives and how easily you can switch later.

Also in this category

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8 European alternatives to Resurf — GDPR-compliant & EU-hosted · EU Sovereignty Score