There are hundreds of note taking apps on the market, but few rival Evernote in terms of features and flexibility. Evernote began as a modest app with a simple promise: to help you remember everything. (Its logo is even an elephant, which as we know, never forgets!)
Now, Evernote is a robust platform that can even be used as a project management tool. So, what is there to love about Evernote? Read on to learn if this app is right for your business.
What Does Evernote Do?
Evernote was designed to solve the main problem with paper notes: an inability to organize them in multiple ways. With Evernote, you can sort your notes into notebooks but also tag them. This means you can find relevant notes no matter how you search.
The app can collect just about anything so you can truly have a central location for project plans, meeting notes, and even task lists. Over the past few years, Evernote has expanded its formatting and capture options. It’s now a powerful hub for all your notes, documents, tasks, and ideas.
With multiple ways to organize your notes, plus integrations with Google Drive, Zapier, and other essential tools, Evernote can be an intuitive, efficient tool for your company.
What are Evernote’s Key Features?
Thanks to its robust formatting tools, media embeds, and powerful search, Evernote can search as an efficient document management hub or even a company wiki. Here are the main features that set Evernote apart from other note taking apps:
Audio Notes
Record audio right inside Evernote and attach it to a note. This is perfect for recording meetings or making quick voice memos for yourself.
Sketch
Need to mock up a design or map out an idea? Evernote’s Sketch function makes it simple. Create freeform notes and drawings right inside the app.
Tables
You can create beautiful tables inside your notes, complete with custom colors. This is ideal for project planning, task management, basic data collection, and many more essential tasks.
Document Scanning and OCR
If you have lots of handwritten notes or printouts you want to add to Evernote, that’s no problem with the app’s powerful scanning and Optical Character Recognition functionalities. Scan sticky notes, project whiteboards, business cards, you name it, and Evernote will actually read the text. You can even find text within those items with the app’s search bar.
Embeds
Want to link your notes to your project files or Google Docs? Simply drag the document into your note window or use the Attachment or Google Drive feature. You can read the document within Evernote.
Note Links
Easily generate shareable links to any of your notes. People can view them even without an Evernote account. You can also create an internal link to each note and add it to related notes. This is perfect for building a wiki.
Work Chat
Need to discuss a note with colleagues? When you share a note, Evernote automatically creates a chat. While not a full fledged messaging system, this is a great way to track changes to a note or add context.
Reminders
Although Evernote is not technically a todo app, it has some convenient features for task management. Add checklists to any note, then set a reminder. Choose a date and time that you want the note to come to your attention and Evernote will notify you. If your notes have action items or followups, you’ll love this feature.
How Much Does Evernote Cost?
Evernote has a free plan, which covers all basic features. However, you cannot search inside embedded media unless you upgrade. You also need to upgrade if you want your Evernote to sync to more than two devices (including the web app).
The free plan does limit your note size to 25MB, and you can only upload 60MB per month. If you’re just taking text notes, that’s fine. But if you plan on embedding a lot of documents or taking audio recordings, you’ll likely need to upgrade. And while you can embed PDFs and other documents on the Free plan, you won’t be able to search or annotate them unless you upgrade to Premium.
The Premium plan is $7.99 per month and allows you to use unlimited devices. You can also access your notes offline, which is ideal if you’re on the go a lot. Your storage also increases to 200MB per note and 10GB per month. This plan can work for small teams.
Finally, there is a Business Plan that allows you to create custom spaces (say, if your company has multiple teams or departments). You can also customize user access and use single sign on. The Business Plan offers an impressive 20GB monthly upload limit. However, you pay $14.99 per user per month, which can add up for large teams.
Pros And Cons Of Evernote
So, is Evernote right for your business? Here are the pros and cons of this app:
Pros
Cross platform functionality: If your company’s team members use different devices (e.g. Mac vs. Windows, iOS vs. Android), that’s no problem, as Evernote works pretty much everywhere. You can even use it on Amazon devices such as Kindles. There’s also a web app for people who prefer to use their regular browser.
Spaces: Set up hubs for all of your teams and make it easy to share and collaborate on notes.
Speedy, accurate search: Once you start storing notes and documents in Evernote, you’ll be amazed by how quickly the app can pull up results. It drills down into each note and its embeds (if you have Premium or Business) to find your search term. And it does it fast!
Multiple ways to link notes together and to other materials: With Evernote, you can create internal links to tie notes together, shareable public links for any note, and hyperlinks within each note to web resources, Google Drive items, and more. Everything you need is just a click away.
Web clipper and menubar app: Capture notes on the fly with Evernote’s menubar app, or save articles in your browser with the Web Clipper. You can easily capture screenshots, images, links, and more.
Cons
Limited task management: While you can add todos and reminders to any note, it may not suit your team if you need to break down and assign a lot of tasks. However, you can always integrate your Evernote with dedicated task management tools such as Asana.
No simultaneous editing: Any member of your team, or anyone with whom you share a note, can edit a note. However, unlike in Google Docs, you cannot edit the notes simultaneously. This is not a big deal for some teams, but be aware of it if you rely on such a feature.
Few project management functionalities: In a pinch, Evernote works for planning projects and collecting relevant documents. But if you need a tool that lets you track dependencies, assign multiple users, or schedule out tasks, Evernote cannot do those things.
Wrapping Up
Evernote is one of the most powerful, full featured note taking apps on the market. For people and teams who need to capture a lot of information and keep it organized, few tools are better. Businesses that want to digitize their notes, create a company wiki, and have a central hub for ideas and tasks will love Evernote. Its flexible, intuitive platform, fast search, and multiple note capture options will help your team get organized for good!
