It's still a Microsoft app, so it can feel a bit corporate for a note-taking app The best note-taking apps at a glanceĪ great free plan that's widely available on every platformĬompletely freeform note-taking, so you can jot down whatever you want wherever you want to on the canvas For any that looked like they might make the list, I dug a bit deeper and tested the other features like sync, sorting, and the like. Over the course of a few days, instead of using my notebook or notes app of choice, I wrote my thoughts, lists, and other notes to remember down in one of the apps I was putting through its paces. While AI features certainly didn't exclude any app, to make the list, it still had to work well as a regular note-taking app too. The other thing that's popped up in the last 12 months is AI-powered note-taking apps that claim to either help you write better notes or resurface the information you record in novel ways. (As a rule, if an app supports video calls out of the box, it's not a notes app.) Similarly, there are lots of powerful business collaboration tools that claim to be notes apps but just aren't suitable for one person to keep track of their grocery list or draft a thank-you note. There are some great super-niche notes apps designed for fiction writers or developers, but they aren't fit for most people, so they weren't in consideration for a place on this list. If you live at your desk, then an online-only web-based note-taking app might not be a problem for you, but it's just not suitable for anyone who wants to check their grocery list when they're at the store. While you will find free note-taking apps on this list, some of the best apps not operated by large technology companies charge a reasonable subscription price, and as long as it was warranted by the features offered, that was no barrier to inclusion.Īs you can imagine, these criteria exclude a lot of apps that people love. I love a good free app, but with things as permanent as digital notes, that has to be balanced against the likelihood of the service surviving the next few years and being able to offer server-based features like syncing. You can't be locked out of your notebook because you don't have Wi-Fi.įinally, we had the value for money test. At a minimum, I required each notepad app to be available on one desktop and one mobile platform (and sync between them), and to have some kind of offline functionality. Similarly, the biggest reason to have a notes app instead of a physical notebook is that you can access it from anywhere on any device at any time, whether you're at your desk at work, chilling on your couch at home, or flying coast-to-coast. This rule also extended to other features: editing and sorting notes had to feel seamless and natural, rather than require a battle with a horrible user interface. If it wasn't almost as convenient to open the notes app and create a quick note as it was to reach across my desk for a Moleskine and a pen, it didn't make the cut. The real competition when you're looking for somewhere to write a note isn't other note-taking apps, but a pen and scrap of paper. Second, all the note-taking apps had to be quick and easy to use as intended. Not every note-taking app needs to have features like image-to-text conversion or stylus support, but if it boasted about them on its marketing page, they had better be well-executed and nice to use. This sounds like an easy bar to clear, but you'd be surprised at how many apps fell short. With so many apps to consider-and so many apps claiming to be notes apps-I had some pretty strict criteria for what made an app worthy of this list.įirst, the best note-taking software has to be good at what it claims to do. If your favorite app isn't on the list, feel free to shout at me. For example, while I love text-heavy notes apps with support for Markdown (which shouldn't really be a surprise), I recognize that other people are looking for different things. I've done my best to leave my preferences out of the decision-making process here. Even after 10 years, I'm still fine-tuning the system I use. Note taking is something I have opinions about. For more details on our process, read the full rundown of how we select apps to feature on the Zapier blog.Īs a tech writer, I've been taking notes and reviewing software every day for over a decade. We're never paid for placement in our articles from any app or for links to any site-we value the trust readers put in us to offer authentic evaluations of the categories and apps we review. We spend dozens of hours researching and testing apps, using each app as it's intended to be used and evaluating it against the criteria we set for the category. All of our best apps roundups are written by humans who've spent much of their careers using, testing, and writing about software.
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