Verified project record

steven-tey/novel

An open-source, Notion-style WYSIWYG editor application with built-in OpenAI-powered text autocompletions. It is designed for developers who want to embed or deploy an AI-assisted rich text editor and requires external API keys for operation.

Project overview

Project type: Infrastructure
Use cases: Documents & Office
Deployment: Refer to project documentation
License: Apache-2.0

Best for

Developers needing a self-hosted or locally run, open-source rich text editor with native AI autocompletions.

Key capabilities

Provides a rich text editing experience styled similar to Notion, allowing users to generate rich text documents from text input.
Leverages OpenAI models to provide AI-powered text autocompletions directly inside the editor.

Limitations and risks

Built primarily for React, meaning non-React frameworks would rely on community packages for integration.
The project depends on Vercel Blob for storage, which was in beta at the time of writing.
Operation requires an external data boundary, meaning text inputs and AI completions pass through external API services like OpenAI.

Getting started

Setup is rated as medium difficulty because it requires a pnpm and Node environment, plus registering for external API keys. Clone the repository, set OPENAI_API_KEY and BLOB_READ_WRITE_TOKEN environment variables, run pnpm i, and then run pnpm dev.

Evidence and sources

GitHub project description: Notion-style WYSIWYG editor with AI-powered autocompletion.
README: [Novel](https://novel.sh/) is a Notion-style WYSIWYG editor with AI-powered autocompletions.
README: An open-source Notion-style WYSIWYG editor with AI-powered autocompletions.
README: To set up Novel locally, you'll need to clone the repository and set up the following environment variables: - `OPENAI_API_KEY` – your OpenAI API key (you can get one [here](https…
README: - [OpenAI](https://openai.com/) - AI completions - [Vercel AI SDK](https://sdk.vercel.ai/docs) – AI library

Reviewed at: 2026-07-17T14:15:34Z