Taking Notes: How we Capture Ideas
Comparing Apple Notes, OneNote and Evernote (the Tools Series, part 2)
In my kickoff post in January, Tools for the Modern Writer, I launched a series to review and expand coverage of popular tools. Which products are best to make writing seamless and easy?
We started by covering Medium features and tips for getting started on Medium. Now we turn the page to perhaps a more basic need: how might we easily capture ideas? Their arrival can be fast and furious, and it’s getting harder to hang onto them.
Writers need a virtual scratchpad that’s simple and readily available.
When it comes to options, pen and paper may no longer be the first choice. Rarely can we count on them to be at hand.
Our smartphones are increasingly key as a capture tool. Quite simply, they’re always there.
Ease of use is often in conflict with functionality. It’s hard to keep solutions simple while also whetting the appetite for features that many writers seek. Navigating pros and cons is a balancing act, weighing many variables at once. So first we’ll look at major features in common, to see how the target tools fare. Then we’ll recap differences and advantages. We’ll follow the same basic structure as before for continuity, keeping in mind requirements shift a bit for different kinds of tools.
- Scale/Reach. Apple Note lives on Apple iOS, and MS One Note lives on Windows. Evernote, which plays on both, wins the platform battle. If you must move across Apple IOS and MS Windows, your choice is Evernote. Otherwise, you get one of two choices: Apple Note vs. Evernote, or OneNote vs. Evernote. Clearly Evernote has an edge here.
- Access. All tools in this review are apps that must be installed, so the field is level on this point. It might seem like more overhead, but this does give you the option for disconnected capture, e.g. typing while on an airplane. That’s not trivial. Medium let me down here once or twice. Google offers some good browser-only alternatives, if you don’t mind staying connected all the time. (note: I learned about Google Keep after this post was written; it’s an interesting entry; stay tuned for updates.)
- User Experience (UX). This is the single biggest differentiator in my view, because a simple app relies more on look and feel than features. Apple Notes wins the simplicity battle. If your goal is “simple and easy” you’ll love it. Both Evernote and MS OneNote will take you upscale, providing a notebook or desktop feel. They can help you stay organized, but if you only want to capture ideas you may feel overwhelmed.
- Portability/Ubiquity. Is it hard to move data across devices? Evernote makes the sync option logical and easy. Do you want to sync to other devices? Press sync. Nice. Apple Notes and MS OneNote give you similar functionality if you leverage their “cloud” virtual storage solutions, but that’s extra thinking and sign-ups. Not impossible, but more to worry about.
I’ll be honest, I love Apple Notes. The day I discovered it on my i-phone 6S, my whole approach to note-taking changed. I found Evernote attractive and it wins the most categories, but it also felt buggy and sometimes over-complicated. I found MS OneNote much more of a desktop organization solution than I needed.
Ultimately, there’s something to like about all 3 products, but I love the simplicity and accessibility of Apple Notes. With my smartphone, it’s always within reach. Evernote could get me that too, but there’s more to setup and configure, and the extra effort is a barrier. Is that my final answer? Yes, and I’m sticking to it.
I’d love to know if you have other views.
This is my 52-week Writing Challenge #12, and my 100wpd entry #26. More on this? I’ll continue this Tools Series at Medium, with follow-on discussion via the Twitter #smchat #contentseries. Shall we ... compare notes !?
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