5 Evernote alternatives in 2026
Evernote v11 adds powerful AI, but the best alternative depends on ownership, workflow, and how you actually think.
Evernote earned its place as the default “everything notebook” for a long time. It made it normal to capture scans, clip web pages, and keep a lifetime of notes searchable in one place.
That story just changed again. In January of 2026, Evernote introduced v11, its first major release since v10 (2020), with a clear emphasis on AI: an in-app AI Assistant, semantic search that finds notes by meaning, and AI Meeting Notes for recording, transcribing (with speaker recognition), and summarizing conversations. The update also brings editor and navigation improvements, a refreshed visual identity, and new plan tiers (Starter, Advanced, and Enterprise).
If you already like Evernote’s capture-and-archive model, v11 may remove some of the friction that pushed people to look elsewhere. But alternatives still matter, because “better” in notes is rarely about features. It is usually about philosophy: local ownership versus cloud dependence, writing-first versus capture-first, or an ecosystem that matches how you already work.
Below are five widely used Evernote alternatives, each optimized for a different set of priorities.
1. Lydie
Lydie is a writing workspace for people who want their notes and drafts to become deliverables. It covers core needs like documents, internal linking, collaboration, and AI-assisted drafting, but it optimizes for getting work out of your workspace through publishing and export.
That makes it a strong fit when your Evernote library is not just reference material, but the raw material for posts, docs, product pages, and knowledge-base content. Instead of turning your notes into a static vault, Lydie treats them as a living production pipeline.
Choose Lydie if:
your notes routinely turn into writing you need to publish or export;
portability and long-term ownership matter more than “one app for everything”;
you want a writing-first workspace that still supports linking and collaboration.
Trade-offs to expect: if web clipping is your primary workflow, you may still want a dedicated clipper or capture tool alongside Lydie.
2. Obsidian
If your main concern is control, Obsidian is the cleanest break from Evernote’s cloud-first model. Your notes are plain Markdown files on your device, and gives you fast search, backlinks, and a deep plugin ecosystem without tying your archive to a proprietary database.
Obsidian is also a good counterpoint to the “AI everywhere” direction most major tools are taking. Even if you like AI features in principle, owning your notes as files gives you a simple escape hatch: your knowledge base is not locked to a single vendor’s roadmap.
Choose Obsidian if:
you want local-first notes in plain files you can keep indefinitely;
linking and long-form knowledge work matter more than quick capture;
you prefer to assemble your workflow gradually via plugins and conventions.
Trade-offs to expect: web clipping and email-to-note capture are not the center of the product, and team collaboration is not the default experience.
3. Microsoft OneNote
OneNote is the most practical Evernote alternative when your life already runs inside Microsoft 365. The notebook metaphor is familiar, and it is built for mixed media: quick capture, pasted research, images, and freeform pages that behave more like a whiteboard than a linear doc.
For many teams, OneNote also benefits from being “allowed by default” in corporate environments where consumer note apps can create procurement and compliance headaches.
Choose OneNote if:
you already use Microsoft 365 and want a notes tool that fits naturally into it;
your notes include lots of screenshots, research snippets, and meeting capture;
you want a stable, proven system for long-term storage and retrieval.
Trade-offs to expect: portability can feel weaker than plain-text systems, and the experience varies depending on whether you are on desktop, web, or mobile.
4. Apple Notes
Apple Notes is the “quietly good” alternative for people who want notes to disappear into the background. It is fast, reliable, and tightly integrated into iOS and macOS, which matters when capture needs to be instantaneous and sync needs to be boring.
It also covers many everyday Evernote use cases: checklists, scans, attachments, folders, and solid search. If your goal is to stop maintaining a note-taking system and simply have one that works, Apple Notes is hard to beat.
Choose Apple Notes if:
you live on Apple devices and want frictionless capture and sync;
you want something lightweight that still supports scans and attachments;
your notes are mostly personal reference, lists, and day-to-day writing.
Trade-offs to expect: it is best inside the Apple ecosystem, and it is not designed for deep knowledge-base workflows or cross-platform teams.
5. Joplin
Joplin is a strong Evernote alternative for people who want an open, pragmatic notes tool with Markdown at its core. It supports notebooks, tags, attachments, and end-to-end encryption options, and it can sync through a range of backends depending on how much control you want over storage.
It sits in a useful middle ground: more structured than a bare text editor, more portable than many proprietary note databases. If your Evernote questions are less about features and more about trust, lock-in, or governance, Joplin is often the first tool to try.
Choose Joplin if:
you want Markdown notes with a classic notebook-and-tag structure;
privacy and control over syncing/storage are central concerns;
you want a capable tool without buying into a full productivity suite.
Trade-offs to expect: the interface is more utilitarian than some competitors, and advanced workflows usually come from disciplined organization rather than polished “magic.”
Conclusion
Evernote v11 is a real attempt to modernize the product: better retrieval through semantic search, a conversational AI Assistant, and meeting capture that turns audio into usable notes. If you want an AI-powered, cloud-first second brain, it is now a stronger default than it was even a year ago.
But the best alternative is still the one that matches your values. If notes are a pipeline to publishing and shipping, start with Lydie. If you want long-lived notes as files you own, choose Obsidian. If your work is already inside Microsoft 365, OneNote will fit naturally. If you value speed and invisibility over optionality, Apple Notes is often enough. If you want an open, privacy-respecting Markdown notebook with flexible sync, Joplin is a strong baseline.