Ulysses App Alternatives On Mac

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Evernote is a note-taking and task organization app that has been around for ages. It allows users to create and manage notes, save text, images, and documents they need, keep track of tasks and plans, and sync all of it across platforms and devices.

The app allows to decide which units to backup as well as runs scheduled procedures – two birds with one stone. Apple Notes alternative: Distraction-free text editing with Ulysses. Like most word processing programs, Apple's native Pages have one drawback – they fail to get a creative into the right flow. From immediately answering emails, to trapping short intervals between meetings – our behaviour ultimately determines the productive potential of our time. But with the help of smart tools, we can make it go further. Here's our pic of the 12 best productivity apps for mac to help you work smarter.

You can use Evernote as an app on your laptop or phone or online via its web interface. The app has a limited free version along with paid premium and business plans.

Depending on your needs and preferences, you can either use Evernote to jot down ideas, plans, and tasks, as well as manage documents, images, audio, and web page clippings, or try an alternative that fits your workflow better.

Let's take a deep dive into the world of Evernote and then take a look at some of the best alternatives on the market. Scroll on!

What is Evernote?

Evernote is an app for your computer or phone where you can take notes of meetings, lectures, web pages you visit, and books you read. You can create lists, tasks, plan meals, reflect on your day, and develop project plans with the app's themed templates.

Evernote is suitable both for Mac and Windows devices. You don't need to be confined to desktop with Evernote though – you can sync devices and use it on your iOS or Android, as well as access your notes and work on them on the web.

Pros of Evernote app

The app offers a collection of handy features to make your note-taking smooth and organized.

Evernote's top advantages are:

• User-friendly design
• Accessible on multiple devices
• Works across platforms (macOS, iOS, Android, Windows)
• Ready to go templates for to-do lists, project plans, meeting and lecture notes, and even meal planning and daily reflection
• Tags for notes for easier search and grouping
• App home page customization to better manage your notes
• Sharing via email (edit and view access) and link (only view)
• Offline access
• Search in handwritten notes, PDFs, DOCs

And if you feel nostalgic for the physical note-taking and highlighting, the app even has a colored highlighter option in its text formatting toolbar.

Cons of Evernote app

Nothing is perfect, so depending on your needs and preferences, you might find some needed features lacking in your Evernote experience. Some of the complaints we've heard about this popular note-taking app include:

• No tags within text available to make it easier to manage larger documents
• Limited note organization tools – only two layers of folders can be created (Notebooks and Stacks)
• No built-in calendar view for tasks and reminders
• Notes cannot be exported as TXT, PDF, or DOCX, only as ENEX files
• Cost (the best features, like Home customization, offline access, notes on PDFs, and others, are under Premium or Business plans)

Evernote's Business plan is especially pricey, and users have shared online that the cost can become prohibitive for smaller businesses.

Evernote download options

Evernote can be a great solution both for individual note-taking and task-tracking and for groups. Whether you are looking to download and use Evernote for just your own musings and planning or share them with friends or your team, let's look at how you can get the app on your computer or phone.

For your Mac, you can get Evernote in the App Store or on Evernote website evernote.com.

To get Evernote in the App Store, simply open the App Store on your Mac and search for 'evernote'. The app will appear at the top of your search results. Click Get to install the app on your Mac. You will need an Apple or Google ID to use the app.

To download Evernote from the official website, go to evernote.com and click Download:

The app's install file will be saved in Downloads and you can install it from there.

You can also get the app from the Microsoft Store for your Windows computer – just search for Evernote and click the Get button:

To download Evernote on your phone, go to Google Play or App Store on your phone and search 'evernote'. Click Install and your app will be automatically downloaded and installed onto your handset.

Evernote pricing

Now, let's talk about Evernote pricing.

The app has three plans – Basic, Premium, and Business. The basic plan is free and allows individual users to create notes, track tasks, set reminders, and organize their day on the web, on their desktop, and phones. The free plan has limits on note size, number of devices that can be synced (up to two devices), does not have the offline access feature, and a few others.

Premium plan for paid Evernote subscription is $7.99/month and Business plan is $14.99 per user a month (yes, if you are a business with smaller margins and have a larger team, you might feel the price is getting a little steep). Prices may vary across regions though, so check the prices on the Evernote website to be sure!

Best Evernote Alternative Apps for Mac

Whether it's Evernote pricing, lack of features you need in your daily flow, or simple desire for a change, we are not going to hold it against you if you feel like going for an Evernote alternative. In fact, you don't have to stick to one app with your notes at all! After all, it's 2021, and there's an app for everything.

Explore all the Evernote alternative options we've hand-picked for you below.

NotePlan

The first alternative that we can confidently recommend is NotePlan. It's our top choice when it comes to planning and organizing notes.

NotePlan provides a tool to create notes, tasks, reminders, and sync them with the app's built in calendar, as well as iCal or Google Calendar.

If you need a clear system for your notes and tasks, NotePlan is your solution.

The app's comprehensive note management system allows you to create folders within folders within folders within folders, manage your notes, add tasks to your calendar, and get a bird's eye view of all your agenda.

NotePlan's responsive calendar is a lifesaver for keeping you organized, on task, and on schedule.

Here's how you create a new note in the app.

Click the +Note/Folder in the bottom left corner of the app and hit New Note:

You can also create a note or new folder by double-finger clicking on one of the folders where you want to place your item or, even more conveniently – using direct keyboard shortcuts (as shown in the screen above).

NotePlan is excellent if you want a simple tool to organize your notes and tasks and track project progress. The app saves your notes as TXT automatically, and you can easily export them or email as TXT to your loved ones or team members.

The app does have a few shortcomings though.

Rich text formatting is pretty limited. You can use the basics, like italicize, choose among a few heading options, add bullet points, quotes, but not much else. The app's interface is also not immediately intuitive and it might take you a few tries to figure out how to use some of the menu options and features. The app is also not available for Android and Windows devices.

NotePlan has two pricing options available – Personal and Business Class. Personal plan is $6.99/month (cheaper when buying an annual subscription), Business Class is $8.33 ($99.99 billed annually).

Great news though – NotePlan is available on Setapp! You can get this and 210+ other apps with your Setapp subscription.

Google Keep

Google Keep is a free note-taking option from Google. It's available as a web version and apps for iOS and Android.

Its simple interface and the option to color code the notes makes everyday note-taking fun and instantaneous. Pinning items and rich link previews make the experience even more smooth and enjoyable.

On your phone, you can also record audio notes and take hand-written notes with Google Keep.

All Google Keep reminders are automatically added to your Google Calendar.

The main con to the app is that it does not make it easy to handle large notes, file notes in folders, or view tasks and reminders as a total list. You also can't export a note and sharing is limited to inviting people via email.

Ulysses

When it comes to Evernote alternatives, Ulysses is excellent at handling larger documents. Marketed as a writing app, Ulysses has a clean interface that fits right in with your Mac experience and provides convenient tools to manage larger notes, texts, and projects.

Designed for creating texts, Ulysses provides a clean interface and comprehensive organization for your longer notes and texts. Each item has a dashboard to the right of the text where you can find your outline to quickly browse through various parts of your text easily. You can add comments, edits, links, footnotes, images, and attached files to your text.

While Ulysses is great for producing polished texts, it does not have a calendar or reminders to manage your day-to-day tasks. Another drawback is that it is only available for Macs and on iOS. To share your notes, you can export them as TXT, PDF, HTML, ePUB, DOCX, or publish to Medium or WordPress.

Ulysses monthly subscription costs $5.99 (cheaper if bought for the year, price also varies by region). With your Setapp subscription, you can use Ulysses and more than 200 apps all under a single plan!

Conclusion

Keeping track of your notes, thoughts, ideas, and projects can be a little challenging. To make the experience fun and convenient, pick a note-taking app that fits your workflow and lifestyle.

Evernote is a staple when it comes to creating notes both for personal use and creating and sharing projects with others. If you are looking for Evernote alternatives, NotePlan, Google Keep, Ulysses are great options that each provide tools for taking notes, as well as collecting and structuring ideas.

While Google Keep is a completely free app from Google, NotePlan and Ulysses are part of Setapp app collection, meaning your subscription will cover these and 210+ more apps to choose from! You can try NotePlan and Ulysses for free for a 7-day trial period with your Setapp subscription.

Note-taking is personal. It has as much to do with how your mind works as it does with what you're taking notes about and why you're taking them in the first place.

Still, search for the best note-taking app and you'll invariably find Evernote at the top of most lists.

Some notes are for sharing. Some are a reminder. Some are taken and never looked at again.

Sometimes a note is a quick thought, jotted down on-the-go on a mobile device. Other times your notes are prepared at length at your computer over a large project, meeting, or study session.

Evernote is fine, generally-speaking — but you're not just anyone, and your notes aren't just any notes.

To find the best Evernote alternatives, we tested and used over 30 apps, reviewed top threads on Reddit, and consulted reviews on G2 to hear what the community had to say.

It's not all just Evernote vs OneNote anymore. There are a slew of great note-taking apps, each with a key advantage over Evernote depending on what you are doing.

The best note-taking apps that aren't Evernote:

• Hugo - Best meeting notes app
• CacoonWeaver - Best speech-to-text notes app
• Milanote - Best whiteboard-style notes app for creatives
• Bear - Speediest markdown notepad for iOS & Mac
• Typora - Best distraction-free notes app
• Workflowy - Infinite expandable bullet points
• OneNote - Best free option (not just for Microsoft lovers)
• Boost Note - Best note-taking app for developers
• Google Keep - Best note-taking app for Google fanatics
• Ulysses - Top-of-the line notes for serious writers
• Notability - Best notes app for iPad with Apple Pencil
• Nebo - Best note-taking app for Surface with Surface Pen
  

Why Evernote is no longer the gold-standard for notes

For many years, Evernote was on top of the note-taking game. With its sleek, comfortable interface, enjoyable mobile experience, and easy way of organizing with folders and stacks of folders, Evernote dominated the note-taking world after the iPhone's original launch in 2007.

However, over the last 4+ years, Evernote has undergone a series of problematic changes, introducing bizarre new products in an attempt to expand its reach. They also changed the free plan in ways that have driven away users by crippling key features unless you pay.

Evernote remains a great product in many ways. It syncs across devices, offers a handy web clipper, and can even search handwriting.

But in trying to be all things to all people, the notes app market has opened up, offering a slew of note-taking apps that are going to appeal to more specific groups of people looking for more specific solutions.

What's not on this list?

With note-taking apps, you need to be able to quickly take notes. Speed is of the essence. That means not having to waste time organizing and saving your files. You also need to be able to easily search your notes to find information.

Of course, you can take notes almost anywhere you can write.

Some people use the cells in a spreadsheet. Others use word processing apps like Google Docs or Microsoft Word. Authors may prefer to jot down notes inside the tools they are already working in, like Scrivener. You can also take notes in project management software like Asana, or collaborative docs like Dropbox Paper.

None of these, however, beat the speed and simplicity of a dedicated notes app.

So in this post, we're only looking at tools that are primarily for notes. Full-on word processing tools aren't in the running, nor are project management tools or CRMs that happen to have a notes function. (Ulysses might be a minor exception, as it can be both a notes tool and word processor depending on how you use it.)

With that, here are the best note-taking tools in 2020 that aren't Evernote.

Hugo - Best meeting notes app

For iOS and in your web browser. (Android, iPadOS, and macOS are on the horizon)

Ulysses App Store

Plenty of note-taking apps are good generally-speaking, but taking notes in meetings poses some unique challenges. Fortunately, Hugo is purpose-built for meeting notes at work.

First, staying organized. Hugo centralizes and organizes all of your meeting notes with the help of your calendar. Notes are associated with your actual meetings, so you basically don't have to worry about categorizing anything. (You can always add tags if you want to.) This works with G Suite, Gmail, or Office 365 calendars.

Plus, Hugo also integrates with over 20 other apps used for work. It syncs notes to your CRM (e.g. Salesforce), pushes tasks to project management tools (e.g. Jira), and works seamlessly with video conferencing tools (e.g. Zoom).

The Chrome browser extension gives you access to your notes from any page in your browser, which means you don't have to dedicate your screen to note-taking during a video call. Just open and close the Hugo drawer when you need to check your agenda or jot a note down.

Hugo isn't designed to just help you (although it will). With accounts for teams, collaborative note-taking, and a library of 80+ meeting note templates, everyone in your organization can use Hugo to centralize your meeting notes together.

During the pandemic, Hugo is offering free accounts to teams of up to 40 users. If you sign up during this period, you'll get to keep that pricing even after the pandemic is over.

Hugo Pricing:

• Free plan: Yes
• Paid plan: $6/user/month for teams 11+

ALSO: Take a look at this guide to taking amazing meeting notes.

CacoonWeaver - Best speech-to-text notes app

Compatibility: iOS (iPhone/iPad)

CacoonWeaver is the best way to collect audio notes for iOS. Pop open the app and transcribe your ideas, thoughts, memories, and dreams. To organize your notes with voice commands, just say something like, 'Cacoon Shopping' and the app will automatically put your notes in the Shopping category.

Unlike other note-taking apps where you need to enable dictation to record an audio note, and then carefully watch to make sure your text is going in correctly, CacoonWeaver records your audio and transcribes at the same time.

You can play back your notes, or read them back, which gives you the peace of mind to know that no matter what, your information won't be lost, and there are no limitations on the max length of an audio recording.

CacoonWeaver also keeps track of where you had ideas, showing you blips on a map.

The UI is clean and minimalistic for distraction-free recording and offers custom push notifications and nudges to help you be your best self.

Because it is still in its debut phase, CacoonWeaver is currently free and keeps your data private and secure. The app claims to be in beta but it is fully functional and in better shape bugs-wise than a lot of other apps you'll find on the AppStore.

CacconWeaver Pricing:

• Free app: Yes
• Paid plan: N/A

Milanote - Best whiteboard-style notes app for creatives

Compatibility: Desktop apps for Mac and Windows, plus mobile apps for iOS and Android

The Next Web calls Milanote 'the Evernote for Creatives' and it's easy to see why creative directors, filmmakers, photographers, marketers, and designers of all kinds enjoy using it.

Unlike most note-taking apps, Milanote takes a highly-visual approach, allowing you to organize your ideas and projects in visual boards. Collect images, videos, text, and tasks all together on your screen.

If your creative process includes activities like mood boarding, brainstorming, storyboarding, or mind-mapping, the visual canvas offers a flexible and delightful experience.

Milanote works for teams and clients too, with build-tin commenting, sharing, and notifications. Plus, you can download a high-quality, printable PDF of any board.

You can try Milanote free with no time limit, although it is limited to 100 notes, images, or links (and only 10 file uploads). After that, it's $9.99 for unlimited storage

Milanote Pricing:

• Free plan: Yes
• Paid plan: $12.50/month when billed monthly, $9.99/month when billed annually.

Bear - Fastest markdown notepad for iOS & Mac

Compatibility: iOS (iPhone/iPad) and Mac

For Apple fans looking to upgrade beyond Apple Notes, Bear offers a good balance of features, design, convenience, and software speed. If you're coming from Evernote, for example, it's so fast, you'll notice the difference immediately.

From your very first note, Bear's design shines, treating you with elegant typography and theme options which include multiple dark modes.

Bear's speed isn't just for writing notes, either. Searching in the app also runs fast, with minimal delays when searching notes.

With many advanced markdown options (or is it markup?), Bear works great if you like to format as you type. Hybrid markdown support means you can see the formatted text as you're typing, although if you're not a regular user of markdown, you might not enjoy the experience at first. You can easily export these nicely-formatted notes to HTML, PDF, and TXT.

It also has quick shortcuts, such as for finding today's date, and supports checkboxes to help with to-dos. Built-in tagging is powerful and allows you to create tags anywhere in a document that are automatically captured in the sidebar.

Bear uses iCloud to speedily sync notes between iOS and Mac with a Pro membership. Still, some users complain that this should be a free feature like it is with most other note-taking apps.

Bear is rated 4.5 out of 5 on G2 Crowd with positive reviews from many note-taking app power users, such as consultants, software developers, and UI/UX designers. The biggest complaint about Bear is a lack of helpful or effective support.

Bear pricing:

• Free app: Yes
• Paid Plan: Bear Pro is $1.49/monthly, $14.99 annually with a free trial

‍Typora - Best distraction-free notes app

Compatibility: For desktop/laptop computers only (Mac, Windows, and Linux)

Typora is a slick alternative to Bear that is even more minimalist and distraction-free. The app is simple, with very little UI getting in the way. It's also beautifully designed, with clear, aesthetically-pleasing text.

Typora has a night mode and also supports custom themes so that you can create the perfect writing experience.

It also has two cool modes. One is a unique Focus Mode that highlights the paragraph you're currently working on, while graying out everything else. Typewriter Mode similarly highlights the center of your screen.

Many of the same advanced markdown features are in Typora, meaning that you can type up nicely-formatted notes without ever having to shift your hand to your mouse. Even so, if you want to get a little bit fancy, Typora supports tables, diagrams, mathematical formats, footnotes, code fences, and task lists.

Typora Pricing:

• Free app: Yes, during beta
• Paid Plan: Not yet announced

‍Workflowy - Infinite expandable bullet points

Compatibility: Desktop apps for Windows, Mac and Linux, plus iOS, Android, and in your browser

Do you love taking notes with bullet points?

Do you wish everything in life could be bullets — Infinite, ever-expanding bullet points, as far as the sky can reach?

Does your whole world spin around lists and bullet points? If not, would you like it to?

If the answer the above is a resounding Yes!, you'll be in heaven with Workflowy.

The concept is simple. Workflowy lets you create infinite piles of bullet points which are also each their own document. Expand, collapse, move documents, drill in and out — it's intuitive and natural bullet points at a scale that you may have never dreamed of.

The product works well for outlining and project organization just naturally. It's novel, intuitive, and requires very little learning to figure out.

The only downside to Workflowy is in organizing more matrixed information. This might be more challenging, because every bit of information may not have a clear place in your stack of bullet points for where it should belong. (Contrast this with Hugo, which organizes meeting notes based on your calendar, so notes don't live in just one particular place — they're associated with names, companies, dates, meeting titles, etc...)

Still, for your next novel or work project, especially for people whose minds work in a certain bullet-driven way, give Workflowy a try.

Workflowly Pricing:

• Free plan: Yes
• Paid plan: $5/month

OneNote - Best free option (not just for Microsoft lovers)

For iOS, Android, macOS, Windows, and in the browser

Simple, practical, and ubiquitous for Windows and Office users, OneNote is a free note-taking app that seems to be everywhere.

Ulysses App Pricing

It's a great basic option, with a familiar UI to anyone who has ever used Microsoft products like Word, and while it does most of the things Evernote does, it stands out because of one big four-letter word that starts with an F.

Free.

You get more advanced functionality here without having to pay.

In OneNote, you can add multimedia elements to your notes, such as audio, video, images, and even websites using the Webclipper browser extension. Task lists are an option, although robust task management in OneNote can be challenging because you can't put due dates on anything.

OneNote has a large folder organization system, letting you create notebooks and sections, and nest them inside each other. The way that sections get dragged around can be frustrating — trying to move one section below another and can have it end up inside on accident — but again, for a free option, for many, this may be a minor inconvenience. Cross-notebook search is available, although there is a learning curve to finding your information.

OneNote uses OneDrive to sync across all of your Microsoft apps. If you don't have an Office 365 subscription, you can upgrade your OneDrive to a paid plan for an increase in storage space.

Ulysses App Alternatives On Mac Laptop

OneNote Pricing:

• Free app: Yes
• Paid plan: Upgrade OneDrive for more storage space, starting at $1.99/month for 100 GB

‍Boost Note - Best note-taking app for developers

Compatibility: iOS, Android, Windows, macOS, Linux, and in your browser

Stylish, markdown-enabled, and fully open-source, Boost Note is a developer's dream. The interface resembles Sublime, the popular text editor, with a slight skew toward taking quick and easy notes.

Boost Note highlights syntax for you and recognizes over 100 programming languages. It also supports math blocks where you can write math equations using LaTeX syntax. Themes are fully customizable.

Notes are stored safely in the cloud, with more file system-based storage coming soon.

Boost Note Pricing:

• Free app: Yes (100 MB cloud storage)
• Paid plan: 2GB cloud storage at $3/month. Boost Note for Teams launches in June 2020.

Google Keep - Best note-taking app for Google fanatics

Compatibility: Android, iOS, and in your web browser

Google Keep is a straightforward notes app that comes as part of your G Suite or Gmail account. It offers a clean, nicely-organized UI that has most of the standard features you're looking for in a note-taking app, without too many bells and whistles.

If the rest of your life already revolves around Google products, Google Keep may be the right pick for you.

As you create notes, they are organized on your screen visually in a corkboard style. You can change the background colors to give it a post-it notes effect. While if you take a ton of notes, this may feel haphazard, with moderate use it's colorful and fun.

You might be wondering, Why do I need Google Keep when I have Google Docs?

For some users, it may be redundant to have multiple types of Google Docs, but others may enjoy the simpler note-taking experience in Google Keep. And if your notes start to become something more than just a note, there's always the Copy to Google Docs action to transfer it over.

Google Keep Pricing:

• Free app: Yes
• Paid plan: N/A

Ulysses - Top-of-the-line notes app for serious writers

Compatibility: Mac, iPad, iPhone

For writers and authors, Ulysses is a notes app that will replace your word processor 99% of the time. Fully-featured and elegant, it is a very power writing app.

Export in various file formats, including text, HTML, ePub, PDF, and DOCX, plus a number of export styles for professional-looking PDFs and manuscripts. You can also schedule or publish articles to Wordpress and Medium directly within the app.

Ulysses also excels at organizing, if you're willing to set it up. With views, custom searches, filters, and tags, it's the most organizable note-taking experience on this list (except for Hugo, which auto-organizes meeting notes based on your calendar.)

All of this functionality comes at a cost, however. Ulysses is free to try, but if you get hooked, there's not paired down free version to stick with.

Ulysses

• Free plan: Trial only
• Paid plan: $4.99/month or $39.99 ($3.33/month) when paid annually

Notability - Best note-taking app for iPad with Apple Pencil

Compatibility: iOS (iPhone and iPad)

Combine handwriting, photos, and typing into a single note with Notability. The elegant interface is nicely-designed, letting you choose from a variety of typing and drawing instruments with ease.

Notability has a nice range of sketching tools that make it easy to recolor, scale, and adjust your ideas and sketches. You can also pick from different paper backgrounds, for example, to sketch your notes on graph paper, or more textured art paper.

Notability syncs with iCloud, Google Drive, Dropbox, AirDrop, and Email for easy sharing with colleagues and study partners.

It's also great for annotating PDFs.

Ulysses App Alternatives On Mac Computer

Notability Pricing:

• Free trial: No
• Paid app: $8.99

(Note: Nebo, discussed below, is another great option that works across all tablet platforms.)

‍Nebo - Best note-taking app for Surface with Surface Pen

Compatibility: iOS, Android, and Windows

Microsoft's Surface Pen offers a delightful drawing experience on the Surface Book, Pro, and Studio, and there's no reason you can't use OneNote for this purpose. The anniversary update of Windows 10 also brought the Windows Ink Workspace, which gives you three cool apps: Sticky Notes, Sketchpad, and Screen sketch.

If you have an active pen like the Surface Pen, you might be asking, with all this greatness bundled for you in Windows, can note-taking get any better?

The answer is yes, and the other answer is Nebo.

Draw sketches and diagrams. Easily switch between your pen and keyboard.

There are tons of cool gestures that make the experience delightful, like how you can scratch out a letter to delete it, or swipe up to join two sentences together.

Ulysses App Alternative

Getting notes out of Nebo is a breeze, with image, text, DOCX, and HTML formats available. You can also copy/paste diagrams to PowerPoint and they stay fully-editable.

Nebo pricing:

Ulysses App Alternatives On Mac Desktop

• Free app: N/A
• Paid app: $9.99