I have a confession to make. I’m sure many of you will agree. Note taking is something I love. Not just notes but ideas, thoughts, hopes and everything else. But I just cannot find a notes app that does it for me. App switching is a big issue when it comes to productivity and when it comes to Notes apps, I have been back and forth more times than I can count. I’ve tried Evernote, OneNote, Nimbus Note, Google Keep and recently, Notion.
Here’s the bottom line. Every app I have tried, has features and functionalities that I need and that I like. Every app that I have tried is sorely lacking in features and functionality that I need. So, until Doist build a notes app, I will have to settle for something less than perfect.
Evernote
The Grandaddy of the note taking app market. Recently they tried to jazz it up a bit, took them long enough. In so doing they have removed several features and functions that I loved. Gone now. I do not like Evernote’s note editor, the hierarchy of notebooks is too inflexible and the tag system just gets messy if you use it.
OneNote
A good app. For me the note hierarchy is great, I love the free form nature of the note editor but I have issues. I don’t like the inconsistency between platforms, I don’t like the fact that printing anything is just a no go area. The tagging system could be great but until you can make use of it on all platforms with custom tags that sync, it’s pretty useless. I really dislike the font Calibri, which OneNote seems to constantly switch back to.
Nimbus Note
This is an app I love, but with a caveat. Those Caveats being, I’ve encountered some bugs which don’t seem to get fixed and, in terms of note editor functionality, it is basically the same as Notion but with several things missing. There was a time when I thought Nimbus Note was the perfect notes app. But then I discovered the bugs, then I began to notice how slow it can be to load notes up. The simplicity when compared to Notion, could be an advantage. It has a fantastic web clipper as well.
Notion
A powerful app if ever there was one. A black hole of features and functions that threaten to swallow and drown the unwary at every turn. But, no real quick capture function, I’m not sure how you export data out if you need to and it just feels like there will be so much I am missing out on that I will forever be tweaking the set up and feature set I use. Hence the black hole! Plus, I would love tables that were not databases and so could make use of some better formatting functions. For me, to be perfect, Notion needs to add a basic table and really up its game on quick capture and how you get stuff into it.
What am I looking for?
I am looking for an app that has feature parity across devices, as far as is possible. Quick capture functionality on desktop and mobile. The ability to e-mail notes in. A free form note editor. Powerful links between notes or databases. An excellent web clipper. Powerful search.
The conclusion
For now, I am settling on Notion. I will use either a chrome short cut or Google Keep for quick capture on my phone and possibly on desktop as well.
I’ll keep you posted.
Stuff Matters 