Migrating from Scrivener

Scrivener is the best long-form organizer there is: a corkboard and binder for chapters and scenes, a place to keep research alongside the manuscript, and a compile step of real depth. Throughline is aimed at a narrower, earlier job: working out whether the story holds together before you commit a manuscript’s worth of pages to it.

Bringing work in

There’s no direct Scrivener import. From Scrivener’s compile options, export your manuscript as Plain Text, or as Fountain if it’s screenplay-formatted, then import that file into Throughline as a new project. A PDF export works too, with Throughline’s heuristic detection finding what structure it can. Fountain or clean text comes across more reliably.

The tradeoff

A Scrivener corkboard tells you the order of your scenes. It doesn’t tell you whether the middle sags, or how your protagonist’s relationship with the antagonist changes across the second act. That’s what Throughline’s Arcs and Constellations are for. In exchange, you’re trading away Scrivener’s research binder and deep compile step, at least for now.

They don’t have to be exclusive

Writers can plan in Throughline, export, and finish the manuscript in Scrivener. Work out the shape first, then organize the long draft wherever you’re most comfortable.

See the full comparison if you’re weighing the two.