Most documents are saved to livediagram's servers so you can reach them from any device and share them. Offline Mode is the opposite choice: a document saved only in the browser you made it in, that is never stored on the server. It suits private, local-first work, or simply wanting a document that physically never leaves your machine.
Creating a document in This Browser
Offline Mode is chosen per document, so you can keep normal documents and ones in This Browser side by side.
- If you haven't signed in, your new documents start in This Browser (on a deployment with sign-in; a guest-only self-host saves to the server by default). Nothing you try out is sent to our servers until you choose to share it, sync it, or sign in and move it to your account (or use the AI assistant on it). Everything you make from the New Document screen, and from the links that create a document straight away (a template from the home page, Start Blank), starts in This Browser. Use Sync Document on one if you would rather it went to the server now.
- Once you've signed in, new documents go to your account. To keep one only in this browser, choose Take Offline from its menu (see below).
- The document is written to your browser's own storage (IndexedDB) and opens like any other. A This Browser badge next to its name in the editor, and the matching This Browser pill wherever it is listed (Explorer lists and cards, search results, the Explorer panel and the Trash), mark it so you always know which documents live only in this browser. Hover or focus the pill to read that the document lives only in this browser and that clearing this browser's site data deletes it; click it (in the Explorer lists, the Explorer panel and the Trash) to come back to this guide. The Explorer sidebar's This Browser row lists them all.
A document in This Browser is not synced and not backed up. It lives only in this browser: clearing your site data, or the browser reclaiming storage, will delete it. Keep anything important on the cloud, or export a copy.
What's different
A document in This Browser is a normal document: every editor feature works, including shapes, arrows, layers, tabs, themes, undo/redo, and export. Only the features that need the server are unavailable, because there's no server copy to power them:
- Sharing needs a document on the server. Opening Share on a document in This Browser tells you so and offers Sync Document: press it and the document uploads, and the Share options appear in the same dialog, with no reload. Embeds are unavailable until it is synced, for the same reason.
- Live collaboration and teams don't apply; a document in This Browser is yours alone. Comments still work, but only you see them.
- The AI assistant works while you're online (it reads your current canvas), but not with no connection.
- Images you add are stored inside the document, so it stays fully local.
- Add a Tab to Another Document is unavailable for a document in This Browser in either direction, and Duplicate makes another copy in This Browser rather than uploading one.
- In the Explorer it shows a fixed This Browser picture instead of a thumbnail, because there is no server copy to draw one from.
Moving to and from your account
You can change your mind at any time, from the document's ⋯ menu in the Explorer.
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When you sign in with documents in This Browser, we offer to move them to your account. Every one is ticked; untick any you want to keep in this browser, then Move. Not Now leaves them where they are, and we only ask again when there are more.
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Sync Document uploads a document in This Browser to the cloud. It becomes a normal document, shareable and (when you're signed in) reachable from your other devices, and the copy in this browser is removed.
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Take Offline does the reverse: it downloads a cloud document into this browser and then removes it from your account and every other device. Because that deletes the server copy for good, we ask you to confirm first.
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A tab it shares with other documents (see Add a Tab to Another Document) stays in those documents, and this browser keeps its own copy. From then on the two are separate: edits on one side no longer reach the other, and syncing the document back brings your copy in as a new tab beside the original.
Take Offline is deliberate and irreversible on the server side: once a document is in This Browser it exists only in the browser you took it offline in. If it was shared, taking it offline also revokes the share links, and a team document leaves the team library. For the owner it is a move, not a delete, so it skips the Trash; a teammate taking a team document offline sends the team's copy to the team Trash. A document in This Browser you delete goes to this browser's own Trash.
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