Evernote vs Notion? It’s a tough question to wrap your head around — here’s the verdict after over 108 hours of research and analysis 🔍
If you’re looking for a digital notebook, you’ve probably heard of Evernote and Notion. Both are popular note-taking applications that are used by millions of people around the world. You might wonder when it comes to Evernote vs OneNote, which one should you choose? Potentially neither.
And after we compare Evernote vs OneNote, we will introduce Microsoft Loop and explain how it impacts the conversation.
Evernote
As one of the first note-taking apps, Evernote is available on all devices and operating systems. However, since Evernote was founded in the year 2000, the concept of a note-taking app has evolved. That’s why people are now considering innovative hybrid solutions like Notion, as well as other Evernote alternatives.
Overall. Evernote stores everything from recipes to shopping lists to professional notes and more. It lets you share your notes with other people and make them collaborative for a price (more on this later).
Notion
Notion is another tool for note-taking, plus more. It offers a clean user experience that is more like a flexible canvas than an inbox or document organizer, which makes it easy to keep track of everything from a simple note to all your tasks and appointments in one place — and it will even remind you when something needs to be done on time if you are able to learn how to configure it (it has a steep learning curve).
Plans
If you think you’re going to use either Evernote or Notion as a free platform and get a ton of value out of it, think again. The only way to leverage the features is to pay the subscription fees, which is fine, but we felt this was worth mentioning.
Evernote Plans
At a first glance, one of the biggest red flags about Evernote is that you cannot use it for free on more than 2 devices. In addition, the Evernote for Teams plan (collaboration) costs $14.99 per month per user.
Notion plans
Notion’s Personal plan for individuals is far less generous than you would expect. While you can get a feel for the platform for free, the value ends quickly. People who need to upload individual files above 5 MB (which accounts for a lot of files) have to pay a subscription to do so with Notion. Collaboration is also restricted to 5 guests, which forces you to upgrade rapidly.
Note: Part of the reason we made unlimited collaboration and unlimited uploads free on Kahana is the fact that Evernote and Notion free plans are so restrictive.
Users
Evernote users are typically all kinds of people who need a place to store all of their notes, ideas, and information. They use Evernote for everything from writing down an important phone number, to making shopping lists, to creating comprehensive project plans.
Evernote’s use cases are broad— it’s a place where users can keep track of anything they’re interested in or care about.
Notion is similar to Evernote in that it serves as a place for users to store all of their information. However, in many ways, it is flat-out different from Evernote. For example, users can choose to use it as either a note-taking app, a Kanban board, or a task manager app — or all at once.
Whatever Notion is doing has worked — in October 2021, Notion announced that it has 20 million users; its sudden popularity may have caught larger companies by surprise.
Features
Both Evernote and Notion offer a variety of features that allow you to store, organize, and access your notes.
- Both apps let you add images, video clips, and text to your notes
- Both apps have a desktop version so that you can access them on any device — including Macs, PCs, iPhones, iPads, and Android devices
Notes
Evernote vs Notion is one of the most talked-about topics when it comes to note-taking apps. Both have their value propositions, but depending on your budget and preferences, there is a chance neither is a good fit for you. This is why we created a guide of alternatives.
- Evernote is a note-taking app that lets you keep track of your life on a daily basis. It’s like a digital filing cabinet, where you can store everything from a quick note to documents, to photos and videos, and even handwritten notes.
- Notion is a cloud-based note-taking app that was designed to make it easy to organize your thoughts and project notes in one place. It uses a flexible canvas-style structure that allows you to organize information and assets in blocks.
Lists
Notion allows users to create different types of lists including checklists and to-do lists. It also has an option called “My List” that allows users to add all of their tasks in one place (which makes it easier to manage them by adding due dates or contexts). However, Evernote also lets you create a checklist.
Tasks
Both Evernote and Notion offer ways to manage tasks, but they differ in how they approach this workflow.
Evernote is fundamentally a note-taking app that also includes task management features. Users can create notes, add tags, and set reminders for them. Evernote also has a web clipper that allows you to clip any web page into your Evernote account automatically. This is useful for keeping track of information for tasks on a daily basis that may be relevant to you later on down the road.
Notion is more of a project management and note-taking app with task management features built-in. It’s designed for anyone who needs to organize their thoughts into actionable steps and then keep track of those steps as they’re completed. Its flexible canvas interface allows you to add new tasks, assign them due dates, and check them off when they’re done.
Productivity
When it comes to productivity, Evernote is focused on note-taking and document organization. You can organize your notes into folders, or you can use tags to keep track of them. You can also share your notes with other users, or access them from multiple devices.
Notion focuses more on collaboration, project management, and organization. You can create projects to store your documents, which can then be shared with colleagues or used as templates for future projects.
Integration
Evernote’s Google Drive integration allows you to create dynamic notes in Evernote by collecting content from Google Drive. This feature is available now on all platforms except Internet Explorer and Firefox. One Evernote alternative for Google is to download Google Keep and use that in place of Evernote’s web clipper (Google Keep has its own red flags, so beware).
Storage
Evernote storage model
- Free — 60 MB monthly uploads, 25 MB maximum note size
- $7.99/month — 10 GB monthly uploads, 200 MB maximum note size
- $9.99/month — 20 GB monthly uploads
Notion storage model
- Free — 5 MB file uploads
- All paid plans — Unlimited file uploads
Conclusion
We hope you’ve found this analysis helpful. What are your thoughts on Evernote vs Notion? Drop us a comment and let us know if there’s something we missed or got wrong 🙈
As a side note, if you are unsure about Evernote vs Notion, you can always sign up with Kahana to start out since it offers unlimited collaboration and uploads for free across all devices 🙃
Related: