A list of progressive web apps worth installing

Why a list, and not a store

A progressive web app has no shelf. It is a website that declares a manifest and registers a service worker, which lets a browser offer to install it — but nothing indexes those declarations, and no store curates them. So the app exists, works, and is invisible.

That is the entire reason this list exists. Every entry below was opened in a real browser and checked: does it declare an installable manifest, and does it still render with the network cut. Those two answers are measured here, not taken from the developer's description.

Drawing, design and images

Excalidraw is the one most people arrive for — a whiteboard with a hand-drawn feel that keeps working with no connection once installed. Photopea opens PSD files in the browser and is close enough to Photoshop that the muscle memory transfers. Penpot covers interface design and is open source.

For smaller jobs: Squoosh compresses images locally, so nothing you drop into it leaves the machine, and SVGOMG does the same for SVG. Coolors generates palettes, Type Scale sizes typography.

Developer references

DevDocs is the strongest case for the whole format: every major API reference, in one search field, cached for offline use. Installed, it answers on a plane.

regex101 explains what a pattern actually matches, crontab.guru does the same for cron expressions, and jwt.io decodes tokens without pasting them into a server you do not control.

Notes, documents and organisation

Notesnook and AppFlowy both aim at the Notion shape with end-to-end encryption. Anytype and AFFiNE go further into local-first storage. CryptPad does collaborative documents where the server cannot read them.

Excalidraw belongs here too — for a lot of people the whiteboard is where thinking happens before the document does.

Games

Lichess is a complete chess platform, free, with analysis and puzzles that keep working offline. PROXX is a minesweeper variant built by Google's own team as a demonstration of the format. 2048 and Wordle need no explanation.

The rule for games is simple: single-player logic caches, live multiplayer cannot. More on that here.

Maps and travel

Organic Maps works with the network off — the case where offline stops being a nicety and becomes the reason you installed it. OpenStreetMap and Felt cover the browsing and annotation side.

How to install any of them

On Chrome or Edge, an install icon appears at the right of the address bar. On Safari, use Share then Add to Home Screen. There is no download and no store account — the full sequence is here.

One step people skip: open the app once while connected before relying on it offline. The service worker fills its cache on that first visit, and an app that has never been opened has nothing cached.

Frequently asked