We all know that clutter slows down our lives. You can’t find your car keys in the pile on your desk, you trip over those shoes on the way out the door, and you drop your favorite pen down into the cracks between your car seats. When our life is disorganized, everything is stressful.
Maybe your physical life isn’t cluttered—but our mental lives can be. You have birthdays to remember, work projects to complete, appointments to get to, and grocery lists to make. You’re planning that big vacation—do you have all your passports ready? Did someone remember to book the hotel rooms? And what about getting a dog sitter? In our fast-paced world, more and more things are cluttering up our lives, slowing us down.
But they don’t have to! There are dozens of planning and note-taking apps out there designed to help us accomplish projects and keep everything in one place. But which one is best? Today, we’ll take a look at both Notion and Evernote, two apps that claim to help streamline your life. We’re going to see which one does truly spark joy and makes your life easier! So, which will come out on top in this comparison of Notion vs. Evernote? Let’s find out!
Meet the Sites: Notion vs. Evernote
Notion
Notion is a workspace—one that you can customize to all your needs. Whether you need to create a timeline of projects, store meeting notes, or create an onboarding process for new employees, there’s a template for you. Doing something a little different? All pages are completely customizable. Add in a calendar, a Kalam board, photos, videos, or link it with 500 other integrations.
Notion organizes your information into Workspaces, and then you can organize your other folders beneath that.
Notion lets you add new information almost anywhere. Click within a page to start typing, and hit enter for a new line. Hit “/”, and a whole world of options open up. You can add text, or a sub-page, or a to-do list. You can format your page—adding headers, quotes, or changings colors and sizes of text. You can mention people almost anywhere (and they will get a notification when you do so), allowing you to assign tasks to people, or ask for advice and input. You can add references to other pages—so it’s always easy to find the information that you need.
Evernote
Evernote is designed for note taking, organizing, task management, and archive. It’s basically an online notebook. You can note down text, or include audio, scans, PDF’s, or even sketches. Evernote syncs across your devices, and can integrate with Outlook, Slack, Gmail, or Google Drive to help you keep track of your life.
Using is as simple as hitting “Add new note,” and typing in what you want to say. You can share notes with others, using emails, and collaborate on those notes together.
Ease of Use: Notion vs. Evernote
Notion
Notion allows you to build whatever you want. While they do have a large number of templates (from job listings to artistic mood boards), the crafting table is wide open to let you mold whatever you want.
However, with that freedom can come some downsides. The sheer mass of options can be daunting. It might take some time for you to set up the exact format that you want. But the process itself is not hard to use—it just takes some trial and error to see what set-up works perfectly for you.
Notion also makes it easy to connect with your team. They give you a link that you can simply email to others for them to join your Notion boards. You can also tag your team almost anywhere, simply by typing @theirname. This lets your team see what they need to see very easily.
Evernote
Evernote has a simplicity in its goal—it is a note taking app, and all you do is take notes. Click on “add new note” to start, and just start typing, talking, or take a photo. At the bottom is a navigation bar that allows you to make a checklist, and templates to get you started—but the process is very intuitive.
One plus or con of Evernote (depending on how you look at it) is that your notes are organized by when they were last edited. So if just made a note, or just added information to a note, it will be at the top. However, to access an older note, you may have to scroll for quite a while. Evernote does offer a search option, which can help you find it faster.
Conclusion: Ease of Use
Evernote is a bit easier to use—simply because it is not trying to do as much. However, Notion does still make the customization process as simple as it can.
Notion: 4/5
Evernote: 4.8/5
Device Accessibility: Notion vs. Evernote
Both Notion and Evernote are accessible on the web, both Windows and Mac, along with Android and iOS. Notion is accessible on any device, at any time. However, Evernote will only sync on a certain number of devices. On a free plan, you can only have Evernote on 2 of your devices—you’ll have to upgrade to use it on any other device.
Conclusion: Device Accessibility
Both are accessible on any device—but Notion lets you do it on multiple devices, without paying extra.
Notion: 5/5
Evernote: 4/5
Customization: Notion vs. Evernote
Notion
On Notion, you can build just about anything. Notion offers you templates based on different departments, be in meeting notes, job boards, or post scheduling. But you can also create and customize pages on your own.
On each page and task, you can indicate what department a task belongs to, include photos, include statues like “complete” or “in progress,” along with start and end dates. Include emails or phone numbers to make contacting clients even easier, or imbed links and videos to let you team see things quicker. You can even use formulas for things like budgeting or feedback trends.
There are different views you can use as well. Timelines allow you to see the start and end of tasks, dragging individual tasks to adjust them. Calendar let you see when you have appointments, and each calendar entry is its own page. You can even have Gallery views, with images and information. You could use this to share your brand social media standards, or even as a mood board for an upcoming dream project.
Evernote
Evernote allows for some customization. There is flexibility in things you can make notes about—it can be a reminder, audio, sketch, attachment, photo, or even a scan of a document. You can include code blocks within a note, or dividers between different parts. Your notes can have checklists or bullet points, and you can change text size to emphasize different things.
However, there’s not as many things you can do. It is just a note-taking app—so there’s not calendars or formulas. It’s harder to share things with others as well. You do have shared folders—but they are in a separate place from the rest of your notes.
Conclusion: Customization
Notion is by far the leader here. You can customize Notion to fit anything you need—whether you’re planning your parent’s birthday party, or scheduling out social media posts for the month.
Notion: 5/5
Evernote: 3/5
Price: Notion vs. Evernote
Both Notion and Evernote offer free options
Notion
Notion’s basic personal plan is free. With it, you’ll get unlimited pages, blocks, up to five guests, and 5 MB of file storage. Notion’s Personal Pro plan costs $5, and offers unlimited guests, and file access. Notion’s Business plan costs $8 a month, and offers unlimited members, collaborative workspaces, and special administrative tools for you to use.
Evernote
Evernote also has a free plan, which allows you to use Evernote on 2 devices, with a 60 MB monthly upload limit. Evernote’s Premium Plan costs $7.99 per month, and allows you to access your notes offline, annotate PDF’s, use custom templates, and has a 10 GB monthly upload limit. Evernote’s Business plan costs $14.99 per user per month, and gives you shared spaces, business data ownership, and activity history.
Conclusion: Pricing
Notion once again pulls ahead. It is a little cheaper than Evernote’s pricing—and even Notion’s free plan gives you unlimited note-taking-freedom.
Notion: 4.8/5
Evernote: 4.3/5
Notion vs. Evernote: Which is Better?
While these two apps are similar in many ways, Notion comes out on top. While Evernote is a little bit easier to use, Notion’s flexibility, customization, and—best of all—unlimited space on their free plan allows you to coordinate and plan for every project. Notion is perfect for organizing every part of your life, whether that’s personal workout plans or professional work projects. Want to learn more about Notion before trying it out? Check out our full review here!
Scores
Ease of Use: Notion: 4/5, Evernote: 4.8/5
Accessibility: Notion: 5/5, Evernote: 4/5
Customizations: Notion: 5/5, Evernote: 3/5
Pricing: Notion: 4.8/5, Evernote: 4.3/5
