What makes a good student note-taking app?
Students capture all sorts of things at college/university. From sources that support their essays, to YouTube videos that inspire their career, all the way to their own social life (with invites to parties or personal development events). Everything matters and helps you build a better way to organize your life.
Sometimes that's the difference between an student that excels and a student that falls behind with their grades. Be the student that excels, take every win. This is all the criteria we squeezed into our research and knowledge when picking the recommendations: Mobile Access: Picking tools with iOS and Android apps makes life easier to access things on the go.
And a lot happens on the go as a student! Flashcards, PDFs, useful AI features. Easy on the wallet: Coughing up more money as a student is a hard sell, so we've flagged whether you'll have a budget for it or not.
All of these recommendations come from years of being a student combined with the trends in the modern education system to keep ahead, whilst making sure you produce original notes and content.
The note-taking landscape has changed a lot in the past few years. Back when I was in school, it was literally just Evernote or OneNote (or paper notebooks if you're old school). Now there's this explosion of options with AI transcription, spaced repetition built in, and visual canvas layouts that feel like having a digital desk.
What matters most? Honestly, it's finding something that doesn't fight you when you're rushing between lectures. You need quick capture, solid organization, and ideally some way to turn your messy notes into something useful for exam prep. Bonus points if it syncs across devices because taking notes on iPad during class but studying on your laptop at 2am is just how student life works.
RemNote
Best for All Rounder: RemNote
Students will adore RemNote. It allows users to take notes, attach files (from presentations to audio clips) and use AI to help them. RemNote offer some good AI features, like summarize to help you condense your own notes and a unique flashcard ability.
You can create a segment of text and turn it into a flashcard, this makes it easy to do "active recall", a popular technique with students that helps them to use a science-backed way to help remember important things for exams and revisions. There is one feature we love for students (premium) is the image-based flashcards. They turn any image you have into a flashcard test that allows you to do flashcards with images, without the horrible preparation of the flashcards as the AI will cover and generate them for you.
Best for
Medical, law, or language students who memorize massive amounts of information. Grad students doing serious academic research with extensive reading. Students who already use flashcards and want spaced repetition built in. Learners preparing for licensing exams, bar exams, or comprehensive finals.
Not ideal if
You're a casual note-taker who won't use flashcard features. Your major doesn't require heavy memorization. You want something simple that works immediately without setup. Mobile experience is critical since RemNote's apps lag behind desktop.
Real-world example
A medical student uses RemNote for anatomy class. Lecture notes are captured with key terms automatically turned into flashcards. Diagrams from the textbook become image-based flashcards. The spaced repetition system ensures she reviews concepts right before forgetting them. Analytics show which topics need more study before exams.
Team fit
Best for serious students in memorization-heavy fields. PhD and master's students benefit from the 5-year education pricing. Undergrads in STEM, pre-med, or languages find it valuable. Less useful for creative majors where memorization isn't the primary learning mode.
Onboarding reality
Moderate to heavy. The flashcard system requires understanding spaced repetition concepts. Setting up good note structures takes time. Most students need 1-2 weeks to get comfortable. The investment pays off during exam season.
Pricing friction
Free plan includes unlimited notes and basic flashcards. Pro ($8/month or $70/year) unlocks AI features, image flashcards, and advanced spaced repetition. Students in long programs can get 5-year plans with significant discounts. The pricing is reasonable for serious academic use.
Integrations that matter
Anki (import/export flashcards), Zotero (citations for research), PDF annotation, web clipper for research articles, and Notion (migrate notes). The academic focus shows in the integration choices.
Heptabase
Great for Visual Researching
If you're a visual thinker (you like to see how notes connect) then you'll love Heptabase as a student. The objective of Heptabase is to help you see note relationships, move them around a canvas & then pop them open as you take more of them.
Many students like this as it gives them a bit more control of how their notes are laid out, like a digital desk for ideas/thoughts/researching. Inside of Heptabase, you can also tag tasks assigned to each note, journal per day using daily notes, or even use mind maps to visualize ideas.
Best for
Philosophy, literature, or history students synthesizing ideas across sources. Thesis and dissertation writers connecting research from dozens of papers. Visual learners who think spatially and need to see concept relationships. Students working on long-term projects that evolve over semesters.
Not ideal if
You take quick lecture notes and don't need visual mapping. Budget is tight since there's no free plan ($8.99/month minimum). You prefer linear note-taking like traditional notebooks. Mobile note-taking is essential since Heptabase works best on desktop.
Real-world example
A philosophy student uses Heptabase for her thesis. Each source gets a note card. Cards about similar concepts are grouped together on the canvas. As she writes chapters, she spatially arranges relevant cards around her draft. The visual layout helps her see gaps in her argument and connections between different philosophers' ideas.
Team fit
Ideal for grad students and upper-level undergrads doing research-intensive work. Less useful for freshmen taking basic lecture courses. Works well for students who think visually and spatially rather than linearly.
Onboarding reality
Moderate. The canvas concept clicks quickly for visual thinkers. Learning to effectively organize whiteboards and cards takes practice. Most students need 1-2 weeks to develop their system. The learning curve is worth it for research projects.
Pricing friction
$8.99/month or $71.99/year. No free plan, which is rough for students on tight budgets. They offer a 7-day free trial to test before committing. The pricing is reasonable for serious research work but expensive compared to free alternatives like Obsidian.
Integrations that matter
PDF annotation, web clipper for research articles, image embedding, markdown export for writing papers elsewhere. The integration list is intentionally minimal to keep the app focused on visual thinking.
Goodnotes
The perfect iPad companion
Goodnotes rocks for iPad users. It just works wonders. It allows you to take notes with your Apple pencil or stylus. This makes life easier to bring sketches to life, but it doesn't stop there.
There are AI features that help upgrade your handwriting, collect up typos and fix them, so even when you're coming off from an all-nighter, you'll be able to worry less for mistakes. It is reliable and fast app that is well-updated and supported by their team. It comes on a range of devices and students will fall in love if they're creative in how they take notes with colors, text formatting, stickers and loads more to make all your notes into an art piece.
Best for
iPad-owning students who handwrite notes during lectures. Math, physics, or engineering students who need to sketch diagrams and equations. Creative students who want colorful, personalized notes. Anyone annotating PDFs for textbooks or journal articles.
Not ideal if
You don't own an iPad or stylus. Your notes are primarily text-based without diagrams. You need advanced features like spaced repetition flashcards. Budget is extremely tight since premium features require payment.
Real-world example
An engineering student uses Goodnotes for all her classes. She imports lecture slides as PDFs and annotates them during class with diagrams and notes. Math problem sets are worked out by hand with the Apple Pencil. The AI handwriting recognition lets her search for specific concepts even in handwritten notes. Different colored folders organize each course.
Team fit
Perfect for iPad students in hands-on fields (STEM, art, design, architecture). Less useful for students without tablets or those in text-heavy majors like English or political science. Works well for visual learners who think better when writing by hand.
Onboarding reality
Very easy. If you've ever used a paper notebook, Goodnotes feels natural. The Apple Pencil experience is smooth and responsive. Most students are taking notes within minutes of opening the app. The learning curve is minimal.
Pricing friction
Free plan has basic features. Premium is $9.99/year, which is stupidly affordable for students. That's less than two coffees for a year of unlimited notebooks, cloud sync, and AI features. The pricing is one of the best values in student software.
Integrations that matter
iCloud sync (access notes everywhere), PDF import/export, Google Drive backup, image embedding, audio recording while taking notes, and Apple Pencil Scribble for handwriting-to-text conversion.
Supernotes
Best for Sharing Notes: Supernotes
Supernotes is one of the more attractive note-taking apps that will have all your friends jealous. It allows you to take notes inside these cards, cards can be organized and put into folders. You can even journal notes, make checklists, use AI to help clean up your note.
Students also like that they can help visualize notes using the graph mode. Our killer feature that turns a lot of heads is the collaborative notecards that allow you to share and collaborate on notes together, this is perfect if one of you miss a lecture or class, that you want to catch-up on. Just works smoothly and looks wonderful for your aesthetic.
Best for
Students who study in groups and share notes frequently. Anyone who wants an aesthetically pleasing note-taking experience. Learners who prefer card-based organization over folders or tags. Students who value collaboration features for group projects.
Not ideal if
You take extensive notes and will quickly hit the 100-card free limit. Your budget can't handle $8-10/month for premium. You need advanced features like spaced repetition or complex linking. The card-based interface feels limiting compared to long-form documents.
Real-world example
A study group of 4 students uses Supernotes for their biology class. Each person takes notes on assigned chapters as cards. They share cards with the group, leaving comments and corrections. Before exams, they review the entire collection of cards together. The collaborative aspect ensures everyone has complete, accurate notes even if they missed class.
Team fit
Great for undergrads who study socially in groups. Works well for students who value design and aesthetics in their tools. Less suited for solo learners or students who don't need collaboration features.
Onboarding reality
Easy. The card interface is intuitive. Creating cards, organizing them in folders, and sharing with classmates takes minutes to learn. The clean design reduces cognitive load, making it easy to focus on content rather than organization.
Pricing friction
Free plan includes 100 cards, which fills up fast for active students. Starter ($4.83/month annually) increases to 1,000 cards. Unlimited ($8.25/month annually) removes limits and adds AI features. For serious students, the pricing is reasonable but not free.
Integrations that matter
Markdown support, web clipper for research, daily notes for journaling, graph view to visualize note connections, AI grammar cleanup, and collaborative features for group work.
A beautifully-designed note-taking tool that was originally developed for students.
Recall AI
Perfect for Research Summarizes
Recall is a unique note-taker for students and is growing in popularity thanks to their AI features. It allows you to take a website, YouTube URL or podcast that explores a topic you're researching and turn it into AI summarized notes.
This is a great resource if you're someone who is exploring topics, or just want to be able to use visual learning methods like video to help build on your learning of a topic. You can then turn them into flashcards, get Recall to folder them and then explore topics that might be of interest, in the realm of your uploaded content.
Best for
Students who learn primarily from YouTube videos and podcasts. Researchers who need to process dozens of articles quickly. Visual and auditory learners who struggle with traditional textbook reading. Anyone building a knowledge base from web content.
Not ideal if
Your learning is primarily from physical textbooks and lectures. You're concerned about AI-generated summaries missing nuance. Budget is extremely tight since meaningful use requires premium. You prefer taking your own notes rather than consuming AI summaries.
Real-world example
A computer science student watches YouTube tutorials on algorithms. Instead of rewatching videos before exams, he uses Recall to summarize each video into notes with key concepts. These notes are auto-converted into flashcards for review. The knowledge graph shows connections between different algorithm topics he's studied.
Team fit
Ideal for self-directed learners who supplement coursework with online content. Works well for students in tech, business, or social sciences where quality YouTube content exists. Less useful for students in fields like advanced math where video content is limited.
Onboarding reality
Very easy. Paste a URL, get a summary. The interface is straightforward. The hardest part is trusting AI summaries for exam prep, which requires verification against source material initially.
Pricing friction
Free tier includes limited AI processing (10-20 summaries). Premium ($7/month or $60/year) unlocks unlimited summaries and flashcard generation. For students who watch lots of educational content, the ROI is clear. For casual users, the free tier might suffice.
Integrations that matter
YouTube (video summaries), podcast platforms, web clipper (any URL), flashcard export to Anki, knowledge graph visualization, and AI chat for expanding on summarized topics.
Obsidian
Best for Saving Money: Obsidian
Obsidian is one of the most well-known note-taking apps at this point, and it makes for a very attractive student note-taker. Obsidian won't give you all the AI features, but what it does is give you a free, offline, local-first, markdown note-taking app.
It's free which will go down well with a lot of students, it's fast but does take some time to learn and embrace. You can take notes, split notes for writing, see how your notes connect, change themes, add checklists, and manage notes in folders. For students that caught a twinkle of Heptabase or Scrintal, will love that Obsidian has a free to use feature called Canvas for those who want to add images and take notes in a canvas/whiteboard layout.
Best for
Budget-conscious students who need powerful features for free. Computer science or tech students comfortable with markdown. Long-term learners building a knowledge base across years of study. Privacy-focused students who want local-only notes without cloud dependency.
Not ideal if
You're not technical and find markdown syntax confusing. You need features to work immediately without plugins and setup. Mobile experience is critical since Obsidian's apps lag desktop. You lose devices frequently and need automatic cloud backup.
Real-world example
A computer science student builds an Obsidian vault throughout his degree. Each course gets a folder. Lecture notes link to related concepts from previous semesters. The graph view shows how data structures, algorithms, and systems programming all connect. By senior year, he has a comprehensive personal wiki of everything he's learned.
Team fit
Perfect for tech-savvy students in STEM, philosophy, or writing-heavy fields. Ideal for grad students doing long-term research. Less suited for students who want plug-and-play simplicity or aren't comfortable with technical tools.
Onboarding reality
Moderate to heavy. The blank vault is intimidating. Learning markdown, plugins, and effective linking takes time. Most students need 1-2 weeks to get comfortable. The Reddit community and YouTube tutorials help significantly.
Pricing friction
Completely free for local use. Sync ($4/month or $48/year) adds cloud backup across devices. Publish ($8/month) lets you create public websites from notes. For broke students, free local-only use is unbeatable. Most eventually pay for sync.
Integrations that matter
Markdown support, community plugins (thousands available), Canvas for visual mapping, PDF annotation, web clipper, Git version control for backups, Zotero for citations, and LaTeX for math equations.
Coconote AI
Best for Audio Transcription: Coconote AI
Coconote AI is an application that is used to turn audio into things like notes, flashcards, and quizzes, with their website stating that over a million students are using this right now.
The app is a lot smarter in the approach to taking notes, as you can leave your phone next to you during the lecture, and then after an hour, if you're using Coconote's premium, you can then turn all of those transcribed notes into a flashcard quiz that will help you to turn a recorded lecture into something more practical to test that you are truly listening. There are also quizzes and podcasts that can be created, so that you can approach it in the learning style that best suits you.
Best for
Students who can't keep up with fast-talking professors. Auditory learners who retain information better from listening than reading. Students with disabilities that make manual note-taking difficult. Anyone who wants to focus on understanding lectures instead of frantically typing.
Not ideal if
Your professors don't allow recording lectures. You're in small discussion-based classes where recording feels inappropriate. You prefer actively taking notes as a way to engage with material. Audio quality in large lecture halls is poor and transcription suffers.
Real-world example
A biology student records hour-long lectures using Coconote. After class, the app transcribes everything the professor said. Key concepts are automatically turned into flashcards. Before exams, she reviews the flashcards and listens to podcast summaries during her commute. She never misses important information from lectures.
Team fit
Ideal for undergrads in large lecture-based courses. Works well for students juggling multiple classes who can't manually take detailed notes in each. Less useful for discussion seminars, labs, or math classes where visual diagrams are essential.
Onboarding reality
Very easy. Hit record during lecture, let AI process afterward. The interface is simple because the app does most of the work. The hardest part is remembering to start recording before class begins.
Pricing friction
Free tier includes limited transcription minutes (enough for 2-3 lectures). Premium ($6.99/month or cheaper annually) unlocks unlimited transcription, flashcard generation, and quiz creation. For students taking 4-5 lecture courses, premium pays for itself in time saved.
Integrations that matter
Audio recording and transcription, AI flashcard generation from transcripts, quiz creation for self-testing, podcast generation from notes, and export to other flashcard apps like Anki or Quizlet.
Choosing the Right App?
Best All-Round Note-Taking Apps
Now that you've explored the range of options, choosing a note-taking application that fits your needs as a student is essential. Each app offers unique features, and the right choice depends on your personal preferences, study habits, and academic requirements.
Look, here's the thing: there's no single "best" note-taking app. I've seen students crush it with simple Apple Notes and others who swear they need the full Obsidian graph view setup. It depends on how your brain works and what you're studying.
If you're in a heavy reading major (literature, history, political science), you probably want something with good PDF annotation and web clipping. STEM students might lean toward apps with LaTeX support or good diagram tools. Design students? You're living in GoodNotes or Notability with that Apple Pencil.
Here's a breakdown to help you decide: If you're looking for a well-rounded solution that works in basically every situation (lectures, group work, personal study), we'd recommend RemNote or Supernotes. RemNote is clutch for students who actually use flashcards for exam prep, the spaced repetition system is built right in. Supernotes works better if you're collaborating with classmates and want to share notes without the mess of Google Docs.
For students doing serious research (thesis work, dissertations, or just going deep on topics), Obsidian or Heptabase makes sense. Obsidian's bidirectional linking helps you see how concepts connect across your notes, which is perfect when you're synthesizing information from dozens of sources. Heptabase takes it further with visual canvases, so you can literally arrange your notes spatially like you're laying out index cards on a desk.
If budget is tight (and when isn't it as a student?), Obsidian wins hands down. Free forever, works offline, and you own your notes as plain text files. No subscription treadmill, no losing access when you can't afford to renew. The learning curve is steeper than something like Goodnotes, but Reddit and YouTube have tons of student-focused tutorials.
For iPad users who love handwriting, it's basically GoodNotes versus Notability. GoodNotes has better organization with folders and the AI handwriting cleanup is stupidly good. Notability has better audio recording sync (it timestamps your notes to the recording, which is amazing for lectures).
Recall AI is the wildcard pick for students who learn from YouTube videos and podcasts. Instead of taking notes while watching, you just paste the URL and let AI summarize it. Honestly? This saved me hours during my master's program when I was watching supplemental lecture videos.