Maya on Windows — a short guide

The Windows build is new. It has had far less testing than the Mac build, and some of what follows may not yet behave exactly as described. If something is wrong, please say so — the checklist in section 9 is exactly what needs confirming.

Maya (माया) is a caring companion who lives at the top of your screen — a little heart with a face. Maya reminds you to eat, drink water, stretch, rest your eyes and call home.

Maya is free. There is no account, no subscription and no locked features. Maya works with the internet switched off, and nothing you do in Maya leaves your PC.

1. Install

1. Download Maya-setup.exe from the website.
2. Double-click it.
3. Windows SmartScreen will probably say "Windows protected your PC". Click More info, then Run anyway.

That warning appears because Maya is not yet signed with a code-signing certificate. It is not a sign that anything is wrong with the file, but it is a fair reason to only download Maya from the official website.

Maya installs for your user account only, so it does not ask for administrator rights.

If your PC has no WebView2 (most Windows 11 PCs already do), the installer adds it for you.

2. What you will see

Maya has no taskbar button and does not appear when you press Alt+Tab. Maya lives in the notification area at the bottom right, as a small heart. You may need to click the ^ arrow to see the icon, or drag it onto the taskbar to keep it visible.

Click the heart to:

When Maya is asleep or you are in a focus session, the menu says so, with the time it ends.

Closing the main window does not quit Maya. Maya keeps running in the notification area. Use Quit Maya to stop Maya.

3. When Maya visits

A check-in slides down from the top of your screen (or appears in the corner you chose — bottom right sits just above the clock) with one line and a few buttons:

• Done ✓ — you did it. It counts towards today's summary.
• 15 min — Maya comes back in 15 minutes.
• More… — 5 minutes, 30 minutes, 1 hour, or Skip today (that reminder stays quiet until tomorrow).
• × — close it.

When water, a stretch and eye rest are all due at once, Maya puts them on one card ("Time for a little reset") and your answer counts for all of them.

If you ignore it, it disappears on its own (after 60 seconds by default) and is not saved up for later. A missed check-in is simply skipped.

Maya will not interrupt you:

• during quiet hours (10pm–8am by default),
• while you are in a focus session,
• while Windows is in presentation mode, a game is running full screen, or Focus Assist is on,
• while the PC is locked, or when you are away from the PC — and the water and stretch timers reset when you come back,
• more than 5 times a day or twice in an hour, with at least 30 minutes between check-ins.

Meals, bedtime and battery warnings have their own timing and are not counted against that limit. A nearly empty battery (5%) will reach you even during a presentation.

4. Making Maya yours

Open Maya → Today to see what is up next, what Maya said earlier and how you answered, your focus sessions, and a short summary of your day. In the evening it says good night and tells you the first reminder tomorrow. There are no scores.

On Today (or from the notification area), How are you? lets you tell Maya how the day is going. Tired keeps Maya's words gentle for the rest of the day; Busy spaces check-ins further apart for three hours. It changes nothing else.

Open Maya → Personalize:

• Language — English, नेपाली, or Roman Nepali (Nepali written in English letters).
• Tone — Gentle, Playful, Extra dramatic, or Minimal (just the word: "Water.").
• What Maya calls you — babu, nani, your own name, or nothing.
• तिमी or तँ — how close Maya speaks to you (Nepali only).
• Maya's colour — the heart comes in six colours, from the classic tika red to brass, sunrise, pote green, silver and night.
• Maya's sound and volume — a steel glass, a knock, a temple bell, a water drop, or silence.

Open Maya → Reminders to turn each reminder on or off, change its time, or write your own words for it. Add reminder makes your own: pick a kind (so Maya has words for it), how it repeats (once, every day, weekdays, weekends, chosen days, every few minutes or hours), optional only between hours, how Maya tells you (card and sound, card without sound, or just a glance), and whether it is important enough to show during quiet hours.

Open Maya → Focus for 25, 50 or 90 minutes, or your own length. If you stop early, only the minutes you worked are counted.

Open Maya → Settings:

• General — open at login, home time zone and call window (so "call home" never suggests 3am in Nepal).
• Check-ins — daily limit, limit in any hour, time between check-ins, quiet hours, presenting mode, backup notification.
• Appearance — where Maya appears (top, or a corner clear of the taskbar), look, size, which screen, how long a check-in stays, and animation (follow Windows, full, or reduced).
• Data — save a backup, restore one, or start over.
• Privacy and About.

About the notch

The notch is a MacBook thing. Windows laptops do not have one, so Maya normally appears as a floating pill just under the top edge of your screen. If you like the notch look, choose Settings → Appearance → Look → Notch and Maya will draw one. Automatic gives you the pill.

5. Notifications

Maya's normal way of reaching you is the check-in card at the top of the screen.

There is also a Backup notification setting. If the card cannot be put on screen for any reason, Maya sends a normal Windows notification instead, so a check-in is never lost.

Press Send a test notification in Settings to check it works. If it says it was blocked, open Windows Settings → System → Notifications, make sure notifications are on, and that Maya is allowed. Also check Focus assist / Do not disturb is not swallowing them.

6. Start Maya with Windows

Settings → General → Open at login. Maya then appears every time you sign in.

7. Where your things are kept

Everything stays on your PC, in this folder:

%APPDATA%\np.maya.app\

(Paste that into the address bar of File Explorer. It expands to C:\Users\<your name>\AppData\Roaming\np.maya.app.)

Maya makes no network connections. Maya never reads your keystrokes, your screen, your microphone, or the titles of your windows. To know whether you are at the PC Maya asks Windows one question — how long since the last key or mouse movement — and to stay quiet during videos Maya asks Windows whether you are in presentation or full-screen mode. Nothing is recorded about what you were doing.

Settings → Data → Save a backup… writes everything to one file you can keep anywhere, and Restore from a backup… brings it back (on this PC or another one, or on a Mac). Maya shows you what the backup holds before changing anything. Start over resets settings, history or everything, after asking.

To remove Maya completely: quit Maya, uninstall Maya from Settings → Apps → Installed apps, then delete the folder above.

8. When something is wrong

Maya never appears. Look for the heart in the notification area (click the ^ arrow). If it is missing, Maya is not running — open Maya from the Start menu. If Maya is running, click the heart → Send a test check-in. If that appears but real check-ins never do, Maya may be asleep, in quiet hours, or at the daily limit — open Maya and look at Today.

Maya appeared once and never again. There is a minimum gap between check-ins (30 minutes by default) and a daily limit (5). Both are in Settings.

Maya interrupts at bad times. Turn on Presenting mode, widen quiet hours, or lower the daily limit. For one-off cases, use Put Maya to sleep in the menu, or Skip today on a check-in.

Nothing works and you want to report it. Open the folder in section 7 and send maya.log. It contains only timestamps, which reminder fired and window positions — never what you typed or what was on screen.

9. Help check the Windows build

If you have a few minutes, these are the things that most need confirming. Every one should pass:

• The installer runs without administrator rights and Maya starts afterwards.
• The heart icon appears in the notification area.
• There is no taskbar button and Maya does not appear in Alt+Tab.
• Send a test check-in puts the card at the top centre of the screen.
• With Settings → Appearance → Where Maya appears → Bottom right, the card sits just above the taskbar, not over it.
• While typing in Notepad, a check-in appears and your typing continues uninterrupted.
• Clicking Done on the card returns the keyboard to Notepad.
• The card is not a large invisible rectangle: clicking beside it hits the window underneath.
• Send a test notification produces a real Windows notification.
• No check-in appears during a full-screen PowerPoint slideshow or a full-screen video.
• Locking the PC (Win+L) for 20 minutes: no check-in appears while locked, maya.log shows "to":"locked" then "to":"active", and the water and stretch timers restart.
• Open at login works after a restart.
• With two monitors, the card appears on the screen the mouse is on.
• Settings → Data → Save a backup… opens a Save dialog and writes the file; Restore from a backup… shows what it holds before changing anything.
• From the heart menu, Focus → 25 minutes shows "Okay. I'll stay quiet." and no sound.

10. Which PCs are supported