The iPad is a wonderful tool for note-taking, whether it’s in the classroom or the boardroom. With the ability to use its native keyboard, one of the many available Bluetooth keyboards, or one of the available stylus tools that enable you to write directly onto the screen, the options for note-taking are endless. Thankfully, many iOS developers have taken into account these options, and there are several wonderful, feature-packed applications that serve this purpose. After having scoured the App Store for note-taking apps, there are five that stood out to me. Their features and strengths, as well as weaknesses are covered in this feature. I hope you find this article informative in assisting you with finding the perfect note-taking app. Feel free to comment below to share you insights and experiences with the apps I’ve included or to recommend an an app that didn’t make my list.
Catch Notes stood out to me because of it' price (or lack thereof). For free, you can take advantage of most of its features except for things such as attaching Office or PDF documents. While it is not the most popular note-taking app out there, it is worthy of recognition for many reasons. Despite having one of the more basic user interfaces, the app is powerful because of its many features such as enabling you to sync and backup your notes to Catch.com, using #hashtags to to quickly tag your notes and search through them, as well as the ability to access notes while offline, password protect them, and share them quickly via email.
Catch is also recommended because it values your security and uses SSL (Secure Sockets Layer) technology to encrypt and protect your data. It's extremely easy to use and enables you to add audio and images to any note quickly so that you may spend your time focusing on content instead of navigating back and forth to achieve your goals. It renders beautifully on the large iPad screen but it is also available for the iPhone and iPod since it is a universal app (another plus!). It’s also available on Android, for those of you that use multiple mobile operating systems.
Even though competitors like Evernote contain more features, I like that Catch Notes’ simplicity encourages users to focus on content. I feel that Catch Notes is a solid "catch" for anyone seeking a simple yet truly useful and easy-to-use note-taking app.
The ever-so-popular Evernote is a feature-packed note-taking application available for various platforms: iPhone, iPad, Mac, PC and Android. It's similar to Catch Notes because it enables synchronization of your notes amongst your various devices. Furthermore, you are able to create "notebooks" to organize your data and tag them to enable quick searching. It boasts more features and a fancier interface than Catch Notes, which may be beneficial for your needs, but it is important to note that some of its key features are only available to those with a paid account.
Notes can be marked as "favorites" quickly and all notes include a geo-location component if desired. Like Catch Notes, you may add audio and photos to notes quite effortlessly. If you truly would benefit from more advanced features not provided by Catch Notes, you may want to consider a Premium Account through Evernote which enables you to lock your app, search PDFs, write larger notes up to 50 MB in size, take advantage of collaboration and note-sharing features, access offline notebooks, and more. If you upload content with text or handwriting, you'll appreciate the ability to search through this content, but it may take some time. Again, this is another area where a paid account is beneficial as it enables faster searching of these images. I recommend Evernote for anyone willing to spend a small amount ($5 per month, or $45 annually) to truly tap into its many powerful features.
Notability is currently available at an 80-percent discount ($0.99) in the App Store and there are many reasons why you should grab a copy today. When I first gave it a shot, I was impressed with the interface. The app is beautiful from a visual perspective and quite feature-packed. In addition to support for typing, it does an impressive job of handling handwriting and input from a stylus. The zoom view enables you to condense lots of handwritten material onto a single page. Additionally, you can choose paper-and-pen styles.
As a recent graduate, an app like Notability would be ideal for note-taking in a classroom where the course material utilizes many charts or diagrams. If you use PDFs frequently, you'll be pleased to know that this app enables PDF annotation which is wonderful for adding comments to existing slides or articles. Like the apps mentioned above, Notability enables you to quickly add your own images from your iPad’s library or camera. Furthermore, you can quickly and simply add resizable figures and writing blocks. To assist with organization of your notes, you can categorize them by subject or subcategory. These notes may be exported using iTunes file sharing or automatically uploaded to Dropbox, iDisk, or WebDAV.
This app excels for those looking to take advantage of handwriting features, personalized toolbar options for word processing, and easy export options. Unfortunately, this is not a solid option for those that would like to easily edit and access their content on other devices since it is only available for the iPad and requires iOS 4.0 and above.
Note Taker HD is yet another fully-featured iPad app that offers tremendous functionality for those that prefer handwriting over typing. Having previously reviewed this app back in August 2010, I am extremely impressed with the improvements that have been made to it over time. It has truly proven its ability to stay afloat despite the many new competitors in this arena.
Note Taker HD is powerful and user friendly, although it does have a steeper learning curve than more simple apps like Penultimate (discussed below). However, with a steeper learning curve comes advanced functionality such as: VGA, HDMI, and AirPlay support, customizable shapes, background support, the ability to share editable notes with others, wrist guard controls to block unintended touches, and additional layout options optimized for lefties (like President Obama, Pavance editor Raymond Padilla, and me). This app contains a zoom view like Notability which enables you to jam pack a tremendous amount of handwriting and diagrams into one page. Furthermore, to enhance the user's transition to its app and encourage use of its many features, the developer has provided extensive help documents within the app. I found the custom background feature beneficial since a PDF form could be set as a background and then written upon and "filled out". This is extremely useful for many users.
I suggest this app for lefties looking to benefit from handwriting support, but also feel that Notability is a solid option for many other users. Whichever app you choose, you likely won't be disappointed since both of these note-taking apps provide solid support for hand-writing.
Penultimate has always been amongst the top note-taking apps since it released well over a year ago. Now in version 3.2, the app has come a tremendous way since its beginning days and I commend the developers on this achievement. Penultimate is a simple yet powerful note-taking app that’s curently on sale for $1.99 at the App Store. While less feature-rich than Notability and Note Taker HD, Penultimate is a solid choice for anyone looking for a note-taking app that provides support for stylus input.
Penultimate comes with three different realistic paper options and enables you to import your own. Like Note Taker HD, Penultimate provides wrist protection and lefty support by preventing stray marks from appearing on your notes. Like most note-taking apps, you can clip, save, copy and paste objects. There's email sharing support and notes can also be exported using iTunes File Sharing. This is decent but I'd benefit from a cloud-sharing and better synchronization options.
Content can be easily organized in various notebooks and pages can be moved rapidly between notebooks. The app boasts "amazing" digital ink, but I didn’t find it any more amazing than the pens provided in other competitor apps. As a matter of fact, for drawing diagrams, I prefer the shape options provided in Notability and Note Taker HD. It also has yet to provide a zoom feature although the developers claim it will be coming to an upcoming version.
Penultimate provides a pleasant user experience and is extremely intuitive so it very well may be the perfect option for you if you’re looking for a simple-to-use note-taking app at a great price.
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