At some point in your life, if you are familiar with the newest technology, you've likely come across Evernote or Microsoft OneNote before. They're both top-rated apps that can be utilized to take essential notes and shared across multiple platforms. But when it comes to which one works better, not many people are sure. In this article will be taking a look at Evernote vs OneNote to determine which one is superior once and for all. We'll go over the features of each app as well as the benefits and shortcomings that each of them provides.

What Is Everote and OneNote?

In essence, both Evernote and OneNote are cloud-based software services that come designed around the concept of creating, storing, and organizing all different forms of media that can be accessed across multiple platforms from your in-home computer to your laptop, and your tablet or phone. So what differentiates these two from each other?

Evernote

evernote logo

Image Source : Evernote

While Evernote falls under the category of a cloud storage service similar to Google Drive and Dropbox, the service itself is more focused on the creation of notebooks and notes which is an opposition to just uploading files directly. Evernote offers different features that set it apart from other competing Services which is why it's so popular with such a broad range of users.

People who use Evernote are more likely people who do a lot of work on their computers as well as continually skimming their smartphone for emails and other information that might be of use later. As a result, Evernote would be perfect for people who need a device that can take notes and archived information while keeping it organized.

OneNote

Onenote logo

Image Source : OneNote

Microsoft OneNote is a note-taking and personal information management application that's utilized to collect and organize digital information while making it shareable to other people and devices. With OneNote you can store things like:

  • Photos
  • Audio
  • Text Notes
  • Video Snippets

And that's just the tip of the iceberg. Microsoft OneNote is included with a Microsoft Office Suite and utilizes the Sky Drive cloud storage surface also provided through Microsoft.

​The Benefits of Using Evernote

So we've established that Evernote is an excellent tool for taking down notes and collecting information to organize and share as needed.

What we love about ever know is the fact that if you do a lot of work on your computer and you need to transfer that information to another device, Evernote makes it easy since it automatically sinks everything between two devices whenever you upload new information.

This factor is a massive time-saver for people who are very busy and need to get a hold of the information that they need. This fact is true anytime that you change or alter the file as well, Evernote automatically updates the new information and the changes quickly so you can access them immediately from whatever device you're working with currently.

Evernote also has an excellent filing system that makes it easy to find anything that you're looking for that you might have saved. This factor saves a lot of hard drive space for people who collect a lot of information that they need to access it anytime, and you can find it within a couple of seconds versus searching through your local hard drive.

You can even use Evernote as a shopping list if you are well known for forgetting your physical records at home. Just type it up on your home computer, and it'll update automatically onto your mobile device which makes it easy to keep on hand when you need it.

You can also use Evernote for things such as:

  • Taking screenshots
  • Bookmarking web pages
  • Collecting recipes
  • Team sharing files
  • Putting notes on file attachments

Evernote is available when you're at home PC, and you can get the app for both iOS and Android, and it's got a free version for use. Evernote even allows you to enhance your experience by allowing you to integrate other apps from its app center where you can customize its use for things like business and productivity or lifestyle and other hobbies.

You can even integrate it with your Google Drive account and Microsoft Outlook, so you don't have to switch between the different apps constantly.

As I said before, you don't have to pay for Evernote, and the basic service that's giving out for free it typically covers most of a person's needs if they're looking for an app that organizes their lives. A primary account can give you a lot to work.

The notes section is where you can collect pieces of information that you want to keep an Evernote; then it can come in the form of a written document, web page, an image, or anything else. Meanwhile, the notebooks section work like folders where you can keep collections of notes in that section to organize them by category.

There's an atlas that allows Evernote to access any information regarding your location and then you can geocode all of your notes chip place on an interactive map.

If you like to travel a lot and you want to create an Interactive way to show where you've been, you can utilize this function to place pictures, and other interesting tidbits related to the area and tag it so you can reflect on that time.

The free version also features something known as a trunk which shows you all of the other tools that come available with Evernote including resources for new users on how to get the most out of there use with Evernote.

The Web Clipper option allows you to bookmark and save specific web pages by letting at access your web browser data. You'll be able to browse through your notes with the Web Clipper option which is a beautiful feature for people who do a lot of research and need to remember specific things about that web page.

​Evernote’s Shortcomings

One of the most significant flaws that Evernote has that a lot of people face is the fact that nothing that you save on Evernote can undergo printing. This factor is a massive shortcoming for a lot of people, especially for people who want to print off their save data either for a business meeting or for they're a home recipe book.

It's also been a complaint from the customer base for over six years, and Evernote has yet to do anything to rectify the problem. Most people found that if any of the texts on their saved documents had bold or italics implemented in the report, any attempts at printing it would skew the font and destroy the story as a whole.

Evernote's response to that is to avoid using bold and italics instead of trying to find ways of fixing the issue.

Other users have complained that the sinking capabilities of Evernote are not that great and many different items get put into a different changes folder even when their user has followed proper procedure with their details.

When Evernote got presented with this issue, their solution was to tell users to be careful to click the sync button and make sure to wait long enough for it to complete before any edits can take place on another device.

While this doesn't seem like such a big deal to some, devices such as Google Docs and other cloud storage devices have already found ways to fix this issue for their clients where you can edit, and it automatically syncs without any hitches. For someone who is very busy and under a time constraint, this is not a practical solution nor is it an active program to use.

​The Benefits Of Using OneNote

For anyone who has a Windows 8 or higher,  Windows phone, Android, or iOS oh, you can get Microsoft OneNote free, and you can use it for free as well. While the paid version through Microsoft Office Suite has more functionality all around the OneNote app is free and available in any app store.

What's nice about using OneNote is that you can sync all of your notebooks across multiple devices and you can modify them from any of those devices to save time later on.

The more recent versions of OneNote well automatically sync your information into the Sky Drive which is Microsoft's cloud service, which makes it even easier to access current versions of any of your notes.

If you have a subscription service through Dropbox, or you prefer a different cloud service altogether, OneNote will accommodate that and allow you to save your information to those cloud services instead. You can change the necessary data in your settings.

Once know is useful for more than just note-taking, you can use it to store anything relevant to your life that's a media-centric. This fact includes things like making a to-do list or organizing a shopping list together. You can even organize client information from your business if you need to.

It is important to note that there is a difference between keeping random daily notes and then keeping the organized notes. With related records, you'll be able to find the information that you saved a lot easier rather than through the random letters.

OneNote’s organizational structure makes it easy for students to keep their class notes organized and easy to look back on whenever they need to. OneNote even offers a template which students can start with and then modify later to meet the needs of their classes. With automatic synchronization, you can access these notes at any time and any place.

Some of the features that aren't so well-known while using OneNote is the fact that the program can take care of mathematical problems within your notes. You open up a random entry and type out a simple math equation and as soon as you hit enter after the equals sign OneNote automatically calculates the correct value for you.

OneNote can calculate things such as:

  • Trigonometric functions
  • Radians
  • Logarithms
  • Derivatives
  • Integrals

And that's just a couple of the math functions that are capable of doing. However, please note that if you're looking for anything more advanced, you can only find it in the paid version of OneNote so you might not be able to get what you're looking for just off of the free version.

A significant advantage that OneNote has over Evernote is the fact that you get a couple of gigabytes worth of space and storage to work with versus the 60 megabytes of storage that Evernote provides. Quite a jump, especially since people who use the services are looking to maximize the amount of space and information they can collect.

​OneNote’s Shortcomings

Microsoft words - evernote vs onenote

Image Source : pixabay

The one thing that one note isn't is pretty. Evernote does have a better UI system that is more pleasing to the eye while OneNote seems choppy and a little too retro for someone who is looking for something sleek. Another shortcoming that OneNote faces that come as a bit of a surprise being that OneNote's Android app is not very good; however, the iPad app is fantastic.

OneNote’s iOS app has the tabbed interface while the Android version has a pane-based interface. The iOS version even has a helpful toolbar which allows you to create checklists and indent text all of which is non-existent for the Android version. Not to mention the Android version crashes easily.

OneNote it's also a little more difficult to use right off the bat. If you don't know what you're looking for it can be frustrating to learn how to operate the service properly.  Evernote is very user-friendly in this sense and does take advantage of the fact that their user bases me not be as familiar with the note based app services.

​The Overall Winner

So who would we say the winner is? We find that Evernote does have a lot of problems that they're not willing to look into or change and that's a problem when you're trying to pay or rely on a service to do the same thing that a free service will do and improve.

We feel because OneNote has already found a way to implement basic features that should be an industry standard for these kinds of services,

OneNote is the clear winner. Despite the inconsistencies between the Android and iOS app versions and that unfamiliarity with the interface, One note proves itself, and it's immediate stinking capabilities and its larger storage options all of which are all free.

With Evernote, if you want to sync things, it can be a bit of a hassle, and it shouldn't be for a service that is supposed to support cross platforms. Not to mention with the free version of Evernote, you only get two devices that you can use while Microsoft OneDrive allows you to sync to multiple devices without paying a penny.

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