Goodnotes 6 Ratings and Reviews

This is an excellent app! I only have one pet peeve…

Honestly, I really love using this app! It is very well thought out and I can use it for many different kinds of workflows. Great app if you are considering starting/ transitioning to digital note-taking/ journaling. I enjoy taking handwritten notes in it with my apple pencil and being able to easily import pdfs that I can mark up is great. I enjoy the elements feature, which allows me to add custom sticker that I use all the time as post-its or stickers for journaling. Plus there are som many other excellent features, such as being able to search in your hand written notes and the ability to back-up your notebooks, to name a few.

I only have one pet peeve when it comes to this app. It does have a typing feature, but it’s a bit clunky and not very intuitive. When I am doing journaling, it is very nice to put text exactly where I want it, so I don’t want the feature to go away. But having to use the text boxes for more type-intensive tasks can be a bit annoying at times. I would be nice if there was a feature you could enable within the notebook where if you could type in a notebook like a normal word document. My work around is typing something ahead of time in a word document and then importing it into the app, but honestly, it would be nice if I didn’t have to do that (maybe I am being too picky)… Otherwise, this a really excellent, solid app that I recommend highly to folks for note-taking.

The Best App I’ve Seen, Can Still Go Farther

I’m very finicky when it comes to note taking apps; if even one feature I feel I need is missing I try to find a different one that better encompasses my needs. For several years, GoodNotes has been the strongest contender by a large marking! I love the mixture of tools, how easy it is to customize the tools and notebooks (not to mention how pretty they are), and something like adding a new page is made so seamless and intuitive! This is an edited review because, since my last review, they actually added a feature I asked for that involved editing the tools in the toolbar for a more customizable experience. Thank you so much GoodNotes team for adding this!!!

The only things I can think of for the developers to add is: 1) a “softness” slider for pen tools so handwriting comes out a little smoother, because I feel my writing on a paper is more often smoother and more legible than the direct translation onto a screen; and 2) a way to add integrated text boxes into a page format that tracks perfectly with the lines on the page (some notes are much better taken typed rather than handwritten, so it would be great to be able to do both with ease).

GoodNotes team, you’re doing great! You’ve got a great app on your hands, you’ve already implemented features that fans have wanted, so please keep doing what you’re doing and keep adding features to make your app the best on the market!

Amazing

I absolutely love this app. I use this more for pdf creation and personal journaling than anything else. If I were to add or change anything, it would be to include a colored pencil or crayon writing utensil among the hi-liter, and various pen-pen, brush-pen, etc. I may be mistaken, but doesn’t the primary photo used to advertise GoodNotes is, in fact, written and drawn with what looks to be a colored pencil. How odd that is not a function.

Also, voice recorder that syncs with ur written notes, as similarly done by “Colla-note” and “notability” would be a highly desired note taking tool. Other features that would rock my world would to insert in-notebook hyperlinks so that, say for example, I nay make a table of contents at the start if my 300 page notebook. It would be fabulous if I could make some text or a insert picture that would hyperlink me to page 288 where I want to read my notes on socio-economic hierarchies. Something like Collanote did. And also the ability to embed videos or audio in a note would really be beneficial.

Despite that slight suggestion party I just threw out there, GoodNotes, is the note taking app I continue to consistently return to. No other note app seems to so effortlessly and perfectly change, adjust, create, or mark up pdfs as well as GoodNotes. No other note app has such an amazing array of paper to write on. Thank you GoodNotes. You are some damned Good notes! You are my most used app among all my devices.

Great App But Needs Updating

Overall, this is my preferred app when it comes to note-taking for college. I find it that it provides me with almost everything I need for note-taking with maybe a few things here and there that I require from other apps. One thing that I have noticed is that it lates quite a bit when it comes to writing or drawing multiple things on a page. This can get a bit annoying especially for note-taking for heavy concept classes like microbiology where I need to draw microbiological processes that usually requires multiple drawings, colors, written annotations, etc. the only way I have found to fix this is by going out of the notebook and going back in. Additionally, I think there needs to be a sensitivity adjuster for the scribble-to-erase feature. I have been finding it very annoying when it does not erase and leaves the scribble. I understand that some people do not like this feature but they are able to turn it off. However, for people like, me that need this feature to keep up with fast paced lectures, it gets annoying when it takes me multiple scribbles to erase and sometimes I just give up and use the regular eraser. I have found that if it does not erase with scribbles after about 4-5 times, it just completely stops working. These are the only current complaints that I have. Overall, I would definitely recommend this app to others who are looking for a well-balanced note-taking app for school work or general work.

Good but needs some more work

It’s my first time using an app like this and overall it’s going great but the following additions could be considered: -option to clear all annotations/notes on a document instead of having to clear each page one by one -an undo shortcut like a two finger tap on the screen similar to how it is on Procreate -another general view that doesn’t entail having to open each folder one by one to see what’s inside it -positioning the tool bar to the right or left of the screen as well -being able to zoom out of the document page instead of just the default full screen fit.

updated review: i love you goodnotes but you seriously need to fix a few major issues. i tried to switch to notability but goodnotes is really great so i came back. the first issue is the huge amount of battery consumption. another one is that i keep having importing issues from google docs every single time since the first day i started using this app. i’ll always have to import every file one by one which is really annoying and time consuming since it will give me errors even then.
a possible addition would be to have different ways to view the current document you are working on like in notability. i want to be able to have an option to view it with 2, 4, 6, pages in a single page, etc. another one would be to have a list view with a e homepage also like in notability.
please fix these issues goodnotes!! you’re too good to give up.

LOVE the app, just a few feedback suggestions

First and foremost, the fact that this app is a one-time purchase unlike other apps that require a subscription is the main reason that I bought it and on of the main reasons I still use it. The app has many customizable options, has a cool smart study feature, easy to use, and each facet this app offers is used in different ways for my college courses. I have a journal to keep track of assignment dates, flash cards to summarize points for tests, notebooks to hand write notes, and the option to import class slides that I can directly write on to avoid the stress of writing bullet points given in class and what professors lecture. My main feedback for the company likes in their new smart study feature. For one, if they made it possible in the type section itself to change formatting, fonts, use subscripts/superscripts, color, etc., I’d use it more often. I know I can technically do this in the draw section, but in the typing section it’d be more convenient. I also I think there should be an option to turn off night mode in the app itself versus only relying on the device settings. I also think there should be templates for the smart study flashcards that are either flash card style or graph paper style. Overall its a great experience, the suggestions above just peeve me a bit. I still definitely recommend this app!

Amazing Note taking and file holder

I love this app so much. I don’t do reviews but this app definitely deserve it. I am in nursing school and this app makes my life so much easier from taking notes to uploading them, PowerPoint into pdf that I can take notes on, to saving files and having different files for different classes all condensed into one file….is just so amazing. All I do is take my phone, laptop and my ipad and I am good. It’s so amazing and most importantly it makes everything so simple and easy to use. One of my favorite features is being able to have it on my phone ipad and MacBook. I can upload pictures and multiple things on here and also it saves everything. It is definitely good notes. I want to Thank the creators so much for creating such an amazing tool for students and helping them succeed in their academics. God bless you. And I am wishing best of luck to everyone who are using this app to accomplish their academics goals! You will not be disappointed!

Suggestions:;now that it has an audio record. I wish it gives you option to drag the different audios in one file into the notes. That way in each notes or writing you can have the audio right beside it and won’t have to guess what or when it was taken. It being up at the corner is pretty difficult trying to navigate it and not being able to tittle it.

For the most part pretty great

I was looking for an app where I can annotate pdfs, and switch between the computer and an iPad while doing so. I love the capabilities, and the layout. I like that you can choose covers for notebooks, and that there are even so many different types of "papers" to choose from, from dotted, lined to even Cornell notes. And that you can add pages to pdfs, or can easily take photos and then export them as pdfs. Furthermore, whenever I edit a pdf on the iPad, it would automatically sync to the app on the Mac.

My main problem is with the glitches on the Mac app. Often when selecting the highlighting tool, the highlighting has to be done manually, which is difficult to do on the computer without touch screen. You can also select text and then click highlight, but I would like that capability when I am using the highlighter specifically. The option to select the text would also often not work after a while, and I would have to quit Goodnotes and open it back up again. And finally, there is also no convenient way to underline, which currently would require manually drawing lines under text. The layout of the files is also sometimes not as intuitive for me, and I would like to have the option of seeing my file folders on the side bar as well.

But other than that, I am enjoying using Goodnotes so far, and feel that the pros definitely outweigh the cons (which I hope will be improved soon with updates!)

Almost perfect!

After using OneNote for a while and finding it doesn’t have all the features I want like importing PDFs and PowerPoint slides or a really good writing experience, and then trying Notability but not wanting to use a subscription based service, I decided to try GoodNotes. First impressions, very clean app with good organization! Love how the notebooks are more like real notebooks with page separation (you can choose not to separate though) and different page colors and styles as well as some really pretty covers. Also love the writing experience, like all the pen colors and sizes are nice and everything feels smooth and adding pictures are super easy. I’m really glad there’s a search function as well to easily find stuff in my notes.

Though, I do have some problems with this app. I wish that I could put more than 3 pen colors at the top, I feel like a few more slots would be great. I would also love if the pen size could stay on each slot if that makes sense, kinda like OneNote, rather than me having the change the pen size every time I switch colors. I think it would be cool if like Notability there could be a voice recording feature, and paper styles with texture like real paper added. This is a smaller issue but it would be cool if some different folder colors were added as well for even better organization :)

Overall really like this app but there are some improvements that could be made!

Developer Response ,

Thanks for a balanced review! We can see how it would be useful to support all those things like more color slots, favorite pens, different folder colors, etc. and we've noted your request. Please upvote similar ideas on feedback.goodnotes.com.

I LOVE this app, best notetaking app out there!

This is the best notetaking app ever. I'm an AP and Honors student in highschool, and I live for this app. Since doing online school this year due to the pandemic, it has changed how I take notes and turned in assignment. I love how GoodNotes is uploaded to the cloud so you can look at your notes no matter where you are or what device you are on. I like typing my science notes on my computer, and I love that I can switch over to my IPad to draw graphs and symbols whenever needed. I love using my Apple pencil to take all my other notes, its perfect for hand writing notes. I love all the different paper types and the covers you can choose from. You can also organize all of your documents into folders. My favorite thing BY FAR is that you can download pretty much ANY pdf or worksheet into GoodNotes and write directly on the document. Especially because of online school, a lot of my teachers post their worksheets on GoogleClassroom, and being able to download the documents and write directly onto it, and then I can just drag and drop the PDF from my desktop into Classroom ITS AMAZING! It saves me so much paper, and has helped me stay so organized with everything in one place. The format and interfacing is incredible, you HAVE to try this note taking app, it's incredible. I would recommend this to ANYONE and EVERYONE. Please get it for yoruself and check it out!