As we increasingly move into a multi-device world, and with connectivity and cloud computing becoming more pervasive, note-taking apps are becoming increasingly popular as a way for people to organize their information and thoughts, and have them accessible whatever device they’re using.
One of the early innovators in the space was Evernote – perhaps the dominant player in the market today – and Microsoft is using the dominance of its Office productivity suite to push its solution, called OneNote.
The new kid on the block is Google Keep, which relaunched its old Notebook service recently with a new name, new interface and new functionality.
In a post on Google’s official blog announcing Google Keep, Katherine Kuan, a software engineer with Google, likened the app to the digital version of sticky notes. Unfortunately, sticky notes are too easily lost.
“To solve this problem we’ve created Google Keep. With Keep you can quickly jot ideas down when you think of them and even include checklists and photos to keep track of what’s important to you. Your notes are safely stored in Google Drive and synced to all your devices so you can always have them at hand,” said Kuan. “If it’s more convenient to speak than to type that’s fine—Keep transcribes voice memos for you automatically. There’s super-fast search to find what you’re looking for and when you’re finished with a note you can archive or delete it.”
So does Keep keep up with its more established competitors? One obvious limitation is that, for now, it’s only available for Android devices running 4.0 or better. According to a comparison done by PC World, each has their pluses, but unless you live heavily in Google or Microsoft, they recommend Evernote as the most diverse and capable choice.