1y ago

What's your favorite note-taking application?

Currently I'm using Joplin with Syncthing-backed file system synchronization. I'm pretty pleased with it, as I do like tagging- and Markdown-based systems.

I plan to upgrade to server-based synchronization, but before doing that, however, I wanted to see what other people are using.

Edit: So far I see a slight favor towards Joplin and Logseq, but I totally didn't expect (and appreciate) getting so many different answers.

147 comments

Logseq, it’s a lot like Obsidian as it also has knowledge graphs, tags, is markdown-based and self-hostable but, in contrast to Obsidian, it’s fully open source
- Much prefer Logseq as well.
- Checking out Logseq now. I switched to Obsidian a few months ago and have been really liking it. Was time to switch it up from org-mode after YEARS of using it
- Logseq user here too.
  However, for a quick, transitory note, I use Kate or, more recently, Xpad. Only then I transcribe the content to Logseq. Why?
  Because while Logseq is great as an outliner and for network thinking, it's as graceful and agile as an elephant.
  The gist of what I'm saying is: for now, and for me (hardware might be playing a role here, but I don't think so) Logseq is a good note database. For quick typing, I have to use something else.

Unsaved n++ tabs
- There's dozens of us
- This is the way
- It automatically restoring all those unsaved notes has made me so lazy.
- I do that for some random notes, but I prefer app like Obsidian for managing notes/todo lists for some stuff like projects, etc.

Obsidian is where I landed after trying several.
- Just tried it for a bit. Looks pretty sleek and has some nice features, but it seems like it's not open-source, which is something I'd like to avoid.
  
  I am not trying to defend Obsidian here in regards to its closed source but in the least the notes are not obscured in some database and use markdown format. So once they go away from that, I am out and still have all my notes accessible.

Joplin. Obsidian is not open source, doesn’t have native self hosting and it gets complicated. Joplin is very simple and just works. Although, it stores the notes in a hashed database, so you can’t edit raw files without Joplin client
- Trilium for the same reasons, but the featureset of Trilium is more like Obsidian.
  
  ~~Trillium was originally created to be an open source replacement for Roam Research.~~ Trilium came out in 2017, and had Roam-like features before Roam even existed. It's similarities to Obsidian are purely coincidental, probably because Obsidian is designed to be a cross between Roam and Evernote.
- Problem with Joplin: The raw files are randomly named so you can't easily find a specific note
  
  That's not even the bigger problem. I found the desktop ui very clunky. There were too many papercuts for me to keep using joplin. However, its TUI and mobile app are excellent.

Obsidian. I know it's not open source, but it just felt right.
- Yep just swapped over from a self hosted solution with gitlab and sublime.. But that was to restrictive and the overall experience wasnt really good...
  I then found a post somewhere on lemmy a post abotu PKMS and what people are using... One was obsidian... So I tried it and I'm really happy
  Edit: I saw some comments about some missing self hosting. Since the notes are saved as standard md files you easily ca sync them with whatever you want... I set it up with my synology NAS and DS Drive, but any tool which can sync two-ways should be fine
- Yep, same. Though if Acreom ever goes local only on mobile OR when Notesnook opens up self hosting, I will take another look.
  
  Just fyi notesnook is not really “zero knowledge”. They’re misusing that term.
- Not being open source is the great... sin for me. Note taking is an investment in the future, and betting on a closed source platform is a big no no—for me, that is.
  I know the content is safe in Obsidian, since it's just Markdown files. But the workflow? Not so much.
  And I know the developers behind Obsidian have their reasons to close source it. Nothing against that. But since that's their way, it's not my way.

Joplin as well, syching my 3 devices with the WebDAV option. I checked a few other options about a year ago and Joplin seemed the best.
- Joplin is where I landed, as well as hosting my own Joplin Server.
  If Obsidian allowed a free self hosted option, I would have picked it over Joplin. (Yes, I tried the free plugin, but it at times wouldn’t sync correctly and I would end up losing notes.)

https://notion.so It's a web-based editor with a good android app. Has basic formatting, plugins/integrations, and dark mode. It's free for individual use cases. Has some nice paid features for collaboration and business use cases, though the free plan still allows sharing and concurrent editing.
E: noticed this is in self hosted after posting. Maybe not what you're looking for, but it's a good service if you're ok with that.
- My only problem with them is the android app, while it has nice features it's soo slow that even on flagship phones it is hard to use, and when you have multiple accounts switching between them is awful, either the files won't load or it won't refresh the interface at all. I usually switch the workspace and then restart the app. Sometimes I can't open the subfiles of a file until I restart the app and wait for it to load.
  
  I think the reason for that is touch screen, it is only good for social media. I use Google Keep on Android because it is fast and later copy the notes to Notion.
- Wish there was a self-hosted version of notion with all the same features
  
  The closest is nextcloud collectives, tables, tasks and deck

Logseq

Obsidian, and there's also another one that's not yet self-hostable but planning to, called Notesnook

I've been running the Joplin server for over a year with clients on four laptops and three phones and share notes with my wife and its wonderful. There are certainly quirks and sometimes sync issues but by and large I'm really happy with it. There seems to be one cluster of notes I have that always irritates a fresh client sync and it shows up at 50 conflicts but I work through it. Also my notebooks are huge and the first sync can take an hour. It's a lot slower than I'd expect.
- I’ve been running Joplin server for about two years now, and I concur. It’s been great.

Trillium although I wish it has multiple users on the same instance, other than that it's amazing and suits my needs.
- I was a fan too, but lost the portable version I was using when my usb died. The version I pulled off git now freezes every 10 seconds and closes itself down a lot. Not sure how they made it worse but it's worse now.
  
  cant you download the earlier version instead?
  
  Were you downloading master or the latest release? If you're interested in using it, post the issue you have on their GitHub. The main dev is super helpful

A nice grid lined notebook and a mechanical pencil is still my favorite.
I like to use Google Keep for certain things, but I have a hard time explaining how those things are better for Google Keep.
I'm looking at giving Neorg a try.
- A nice grid lined notebook and a mechanical pencil is still my favorite.
  If only my default font wasn't so bad that it causes data loss.
- I also really liked Google Keep. Carnet was at one point a decent drop-in replacement on Android+Nextcloud, but it got progressively bitrotted over time and now I just use Nextcloud Notes until I find something better.
  
  Ever try Quillpad? I don't love that it's sync is stuck on Nextcloud, but it's the best feature for feature keep replacement that I could find.

Logseq.
I used Joplin in the past, but just didn't quite get completely comfortable with it.
I also tried Nextcloud in the past... that project has become too big for my needs and the file syncing had issues.
Logseq is very similar to Joplin (ie markdown files), but IMHO the editor is easier with Logseq, plus the files are just simple plaintext files, named after the page title, so are easy to edit outside of the application (and immediately update in the app)
At first, I was a little unsure of Logseq's default of working as a daily journal, but after a while it makes more sense for me - I use it at work, so 99.9% of my notes are meetings, tasks that occur during daily life... and of course those daily journals can refer to other "non-time based" project pages...
I also use syncthing to sync the notes between android phone, linux and Windows laptops and my NAS... so that wouldn't change for you.

Markor on Android and Obsidian on Desktop.
All synced with syncthing

I use Obsidian - it's phenomenal! https://avidandrew.com/elevate-your-note-taking-with-obsidian.html

Logseq with Syncthing!
Love the journal style to it
- Me too. Something about the bullet point style of note taking just clicked in me, and now I can't go back.
- Testing this out now.

I am currently on Obsidian without any sync at all. Using this in both desktop and mobile.
But used it more in mobile for an offline note-taking app where I could write and read them without any internet connection. Especially to load images from local, make categorization (folders) and more with data I had in my mobile.
While for desktop, I rarely opened it anymore. I am more into VIM with markdown format and then just push it to git host for a quicker note taking.

Hi all, I created the !pkms@sh.itjust.works community for this exact reason.

Emacs + org-mode for task planning and knowledge base, Obsidian + Syncthing for notes on-the-go.
- Holy crap I didn't know Syncthing existed and just realized it's perfect for my use case (taking D&D notes and keeping them on multiple devices). Thanks for the useful comment!
  
  You are welcome! :)
- Chiming in with my org mode setup as well:
  Keep notes on my NAS
  Mount NFS share with notes on desktop and edit with Emacs
  Create a WebDAV share of the notes (so shared both using nfs and webdav). Use the Android "Orgzly Revived" app from F-droid and log into the webdav share
  I used to use Syncthing to avoid having both NFS and Webdav but it didnt sync

Emacs with org mode. It has so many feature hooked into so many other things such as time management, calendar, email, jupyter. Hard to switch.

Notepad
On Paper not the computer
- i heard about this a while back. unparallelled support for syntax, doesnt rely on a cloud service, incredible backwards-compatibility, and quick start-up time

QOwnNotes (had to look up the exact name as it's the stupidest app name ever). but compared to joplin it's lighter, faster, simpler (no database but individual .md files and folders) and works well enough with syncthing.
- Works well with nextcloud also.

orgmode with neovim on PC and orgzly on phone. syncing with syncthing
Edit: I'm actually using orgzly revived, a community maintained version of orgzly, since orgzly is no longer mantained
For anyone who is interested in note taking in your everyday editor like vim or emacs, orgmode is an emacs tool (in neovim there is a clone plugin) for note taking, todos, agendas, etc. It uses a format similar to markdown, and a good part is that with the orgzly app you receive notifications for your events. So basically you can use orgmode as a calendar as well (I do!).
Neovim orgmode plugin github

neovim + git with gitea/forgejo

I’d like to highly recommend QOwnNotes with. File system sync like Nextcloud. Superb.
- I used this for a bit. I'm on obsidian now.

Joplin syncing on my Nextcloud instance. I love being able to quickly screenshot something on my laptop for reference and later retrieve it on my phone :)
- Hi, is this syncing instantaneous, or periodic?
  
  You can manually sync. Otherwise when you close it it syncs and you can also set the period for syncing.

OneNote. Don't love being super reliant on all the Microsoft Office cloud stuff but there really isn't anything that comes close to what I use it for
- Yeah, I know this is the self hosted community, but nothing is as easy and straightforward as OneNote. I keep coming back to it after trying self hosted solutions.
- What do you use it for? If you don't mind me asking. I tried a few times to like it before I started my selfhost/open source journey earlier this year and couldn't click with it. But curious what it does that you haven't found an alternative for.
  
  Not the same person but a couple of the reasons I can't get away from it are:
  -ability to "print" a pdf in to it and directly markup the pages without having to open the actual file in another application (it also runs OCR on the pages so they remain searchable)
  -you can also "print" PowerPoint presentations in a similar way
  -it handles inking with a pen super well
  I have lots of academic papers and presentations that I routinely reference for my job so these are killer features for me
  
  I use it for a mix of text, handwriting/drawing, PDF annotation and image annotation, and I also pretty heavily rely on realtime sync between my devices. If none of that is stuff you use then I can see why you might want something simpler

I like memos.

I used to use Joplin, and its great, but the Electron client isn't great on Linux mobile, so now I am using GNOME Paper on all devices, synced via Nextcloud. It's much simpler than Joplin but I need exactly 0 of the missng features.
- I'm curious about changing to a Linux smartphone, on which device are you using Linux mobile?
  
  Librem 5. I absolutely love it but also recognize it isn't for everyone, yet.

I've stuck with Joplin for a while. Self hosting the sync server so it's all saved privately.

I've used Joplin and Standard Notes. I do use Standard Notes premium and I much prefer it.

Flatnotes for me. I haven’t tried many others, but it was perfect for what I needed. Markdown, writes plain text files so no database/easy to backup
- I loved how easy it is to setup. Just was too minimal for my purpose though.

Logseq but I know the sync is tricky
- It's been a piece of cake syncing with Syncthing

VSCode + Foam + gitea (+ hexcalidraw if you want to draw)

I used to use Joplin, I liked that it integrated with my Nextcloud, and the markdown format. However, the way that it handles the markdown files was too black-boxey to me, with the way it split them up in a weird scheme.
Now I use Ghostwriter with straight markdown files inside my Nextcloud folder. So I still get the syncing functionality, but a more flexible setup that doesn't require a specific app to access all of my notes.
- I didn't mention it, but that's actually my one (small) gripe with Joplin. It would be neat if I could access my notes with any markdown editor without having to open it through Joplin. That said, I don't know how I would've handled the file structure differently while keeping features like the history alive.
- That's and the awful android app is what made me give up on Joplin.

I find Joplin perfect for my needs. Markdown, embedding images, links etc. I sync to my selfhosted nextcloud.
I like tags, I would like them to add a "directory tree" type of view to help sort "folders" (the thing they call "notebooks") but only because I am more used to just filesystem type structured filing. But the notebooks and tagging idea works for me too.
I strictly use it for notes/note keeping, in particular "HOWTO's" and specific topic notes. So I dont even do a great deal of markdown in my notes, but I love the ability to add screen captures etc to them for clarity.
And being on nextcloud, I can access those notes anywhere on any device, PC, Android, Raspberry Pi!! Joplin has an app for all of them

OneNote was my favorite until it started crashing on my iPad every 3 minutes.

Historically I've been using Google keep or one note (I'm a monster I know). I've been trying to see if I can migrate over to Nextcloud notes as I slowly de-FAANG my life.
- I find it interesting that every product from Google/MS/Apple/etc is inherently evil in implications from our community.
  I don't mind OneNote, and like that it syncs to everything I use. I guess I've done IT/Infosec for 20+ years, so I don't hate everything MS does, just some things :)
  
  Yeah, my "monster" comment was sarcasm. I'm in the same boat. I've been in IT for just as long and most places are Microsoft shops, with a little linux sprinkled in for flavor. I refuse to engage in the holy war. Msft, esp these days, makes decent tools and you can pry PowerShell from my cold dead hands. We use o365 at work and honestly OneNote is a solid product and does the job well.
  For my personal life my note taking requirements are pretty basic and keep/onenote/etc... fits the bill. Esp since I share notes with my wife. But I'm a tinkerer at heart and I'd like to take more control of my services/data, so I'm experimenting with how much I can pull in without making my life overly and unnecessarily complicated.
- Yeah, I'm still stuck on Google Keep, since it's the only one that's integrated with the (even worse) Google home
  
  The convenience of saying, "Hey Google, add milk to my shopping list", and having that list shared with my wife, is too great. Long term goals would be to find a self-hosted alternative but right now that's where I am.
  That being said I am trying to diversify as and pull in house what I can and notes is one of the things I've been experimenting with.

I still use Keep. That have yet to fuck it up, but I'm sure they will eventually. Just like every god damn thing they do.

I tried so many, eventually landed on trilium. It's not perfect by any means, but it ticks the most boxes for my needs

This was a good topic to bring up, saw some stuff I have not heard of. Thanks.

I've tried lot of different apps, but I think I've settled on Trilium for now.
It doesn't have a great mobile experience, but the web app works fine on mobile. The app in general is super customizable and way easier to write scripts / plugins for.

I use the one that comes with my iPhone. No problems with it…
- Me too. I realised I don’t need anything more. It’s easy, supposedly private and quite elegant.

I'm using Notion for everything now. I heavily rely on reminders scattered everywhere because Todo lists don't work for me.

Logseq

Notally on Android. Simple and light weight. Has widget support too.

I use silverbullet, it is great for tasks and notes! https://silverbullet.md/ - the manual itself uses it, so it is both a manual and a demo page

notepad

Hedgedoc and Nextcloud Notes

For long-term, permanent notes, I'm using Obsidian with Nextcloud and FolderSync Pro (which I also use for backing up some Android stuff to my Nextcloud).
For quick, easy notes while on the go (or that I need quick access to while out and about), I use Memos, which is more of a Google Keep replacement.

Siyuan. Ive been using it for a while now and find it very effective for my needs. Its gone through quite a few updates since i started using it and became open source in that time. It even has an android version as well which i do have installed on my phone but admittingly rarely use. I prefer writing information on a keyboard generally.

147 comments