Evernote
by Bending Spoons · Productivity · Note Taking
Note-taking app with web clipping, document scanning, and powerful search.
Quick Answer: Evernote has a verified Real Score of 3.2/5 based on 112,000 verified reviews, compared to its App Store rating of 4.2/5. Mixed reviews from verified users.
Real Score vs App Store Rating
App Store Rating
Includes unverified reviews
Verified Real Score
Based on 112,000 verified reviews
Gap Alert: Evernote's App Store rating is 1.0 points higher than its verified Real Score. This suggests that some store reviews may be inflated by fake or incentivized ratings.
Pros & Cons
What Users Love
- Powerful web clipper
- Excellent search including OCR
- Good document scanning
- Long track record
Common Complaints
- Declined significantly under new ownership
- Expensive for what it offers now
- Buggy and slow
- Lost features over time
Verified Reviews (20)
What happened to Evernote?
I was a loyal Evernote user for 10 years. Since Bending Spoons took over, the app has gotten worse. Features removed, bugs everywhere, and the price went up. It breaks my heart.
Still has the best web clipper
I'll give Evernote this - the web clipper is still the best way to save articles and web pages. If that's your primary use case, it's still worth considering. For everything else, look elsewhere.
Unrecognizable from what it was
Price doubled. Features removed. Sync limited on free plan. Notes randomly disappearing. This isn't the Evernote I loved. Migrated to Notion and haven't looked back.
OCR search is still unmatched
Being able to search text within images and PDFs is incredibly useful. I have years of scanned documents and Evernote can find text in any of them. This feature alone keeps me around.
Free tier is basically useless now
50 notes limit on free? That's insulting. Evernote used to have a generous free tier that let you actually use the product. Now free is just a demo to force upgrades.
Still works for my needs
Unpopular opinion: Evernote still works fine for my simple note-taking needs. I have thousands of notes, search works, sync works, web clipper works. Maybe I'm just not affected by the issues others report.
Bending Spoons killing it slowly
Staff laid off, features removed, prices increased. Classic private equity playbook of extracting value from a brand while degrading the product. Very sad.
Exporting is painful
Trying to migrate away from Evernote and the export process is terrible. Notes don't come out cleanly, formatting is lost, and images sometimes don't transfer. Feels intentional.
Document scanner still works well
The built-in document scanner with automatic edge detection and OCR is still excellent. For digitizing receipts and documents, it's hard to beat.
Lost notes after sync
Several notes I wrote last month just vanished. No trace in trash, no way to recover them. A note-taking app that loses notes is fundamentally broken. I'm done.
Note linking is underrated
The ability to link notes together and create a personal wiki-like structure is powerful. Combined with tags and notebooks, you can build a pretty sophisticated knowledge base.
Performance is terrible
The app takes 10+ seconds to load on my iPhone 14. Searching through notes is sluggish. Editing a note sometimes has visible lag. How is a note-taking app this slow?
Legacy user sticking around
I have 10 years of notes in Evernote. The switching cost is enormous. So I stay, not because it's the best anymore, but because migrating 5000+ notes is daunting.
Pricing is out of touch
$15/month for a note-taking app? Notion is $10 and does 10x more. Apple Notes is free. Evernote pricing no longer makes sense given the competition.
Templates are decent
The template gallery has useful starting points for meeting notes, project plans, and weekly reviews. If you use templates regularly, this feature saves time.
Constant upsell prompts
Even on the paid plan, Evernote constantly pushes you to upgrade to a higher tier. "Unlock AI features" "Get more storage" - I'm already paying! Stop the nag screens.
Still good for research collection
For collecting research from various sources - web clips, PDFs, photos, handwritten notes - Evernote's capture capabilities are still strong. The organization and retrieval is where it struggles.
Goodbye old friend
After 8 years, I'm finally leaving Evernote. The app I loved is gone. Moved everything to Obsidian and it took a weekend but was absolutely worth it. RIP Evernote.
Tasks feature was a good addition
Adding tasks within notes was a good idea - connecting action items to their context. But the implementation is basic compared to dedicated task apps. It's a nice-to-have, not a replacement.
Mixed feelings after many years
Evernote was revolutionary when it launched. It pioneered so many features we take for granted now. But the company failed to evolve while competitors surpassed it. A cautionary tech tale.
Showing 1-20 of 12,847 reviews
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Last updated: April 2026