Element Note Reviews

I was starting to love ElementNote, I thought it was better than my previous app which I had for a very long time, but I never had issues with the other one like I just have with this one.
Here is what happened, last night I had all my notes and information there on ElementNote Element Note, the next morning all was gone!!! Just like that, I tried to put documents back, but nothing is working, it shows that the document or book is there but the pages are simply blank, is not showing any information or notes that I had. Most of my documents just disappeared on all my devices. I had 53 documents, now it says that I only have 8 and in those 8 the document won’t open and my notes are gone! 😔 so sad because I invested a lot of work with those notes. I think I’m going back to the previous note taking which it was Good Note and didn’t have any issues like this. I was just looking for something different and better improvements, but at the end wasn’t worth it! I prefer safe than more nice and cool tools.

Really solid ideas on the gradient brush tools. Unfortunately, the latest update broke the force-based gradient tools, even retroactively, so all of my notes lost their personal touch, showing a lack of proper bugtesting. The devs don’t respond to your feedback emails either, which is really frustrating given that there’s a lot of glaring issues with ElementNote that don’t get addressed. For instance, the PDF exports of the notes appear fine at first, but the guideline backgrounds disappear if you try zooming in or flipping the pages. Also, the shape recognition is extremely poor. It frequently mistakens a line for a circle or even a pentagon. I’ve tried all the settings in ElementNote and nothing seems to work, so there’s no reason for me to continue dealing with this nonsense. Back to GoodNotes I go.

To me, note taking apps on iPad should be an upgrade from paper. And not just trying to replace it. Because no matter what you do writing on paper will always be superior. Therefore, an app and iPad app should offer more than that.

Aside from the writing experience, ElementNote lacks basic features compared to its competitors. And it has some features that competitors lack.

1. Writing experience ✅: it has one of the best writing experiences. No competition.

2. PDF dark mode ✅: I never thought I’d see such a feature and they’ve executed it really well.

3. File drag and drop ❌: I can’t believe they don’t have this. I’m sure they’ll fix it soon but it’s a huge pain to not have it.

4. Presenter mode ❌: this is when you project onto a screen ElementNote should only show the page and what’s being written on it.

5. Laser pointer ❌: they just don’t have it.

6. Mac and iPhone apps ✅: personally don’t care for it, but I’m glad that they do have it for people who need it.

I hope the developers quickly add these features for those who use ElementNote on a daily basis.

I recently bought the full version of Element Note. I love the UI - it’s clean with nice animations. I also love the pen stabilization feature - very nice for when you want your handwriting to look natural or smooth. For me, the biggest drawbacks for this note taking app is that the final handwritten notes are not that sharp. I can see its pixelation even from a distance. Please don’t rasterize the handwriting - I am not a fan of the low res look. Another issue that i take is that i cannot preset a desired thickness for my pens. I would love it if there was a way for me to have custom thicknesses preset for me… would save me a lot of time. I’ve been using Freenotes for a while and they have this bangers feature where you can switch to the eraser for only one turn of use. After that, it automatically switches back to the previous tool that i was using. This saves a lot of time and i would love to see that implemented here. I would love it if you would implement these changes that I have suggested. I’ll give you a five star review the day you do that. Happy developing!

I still stand by all the good i said previously, this is a fantastic app.

However for almost two months now there has been an issue that causes the entire app to instantly and totally freeze if you're using the floating keyboard on iPadOS. I exclusively use the floating keyboard to swipe type with my apple pencil which has made using Element very difficult.

I can totally understand bugs and hiccups happen, but i can't even get in touch with the dev to find a solution, a timeline fora fix or if he's even aware of the problem.

Original Review ⬇️
ElementNote is phenomenal, great UI, great tools, collaborative editing and sharing of notes! For the price just buy it you won’t regret it.

Hopefully there’s more to come as their are a few things I find a bit cumbersome such as:

-Editing the font in text boxes is kind of a pain. Plus their really needs to be a toolbar button for the text box option.

-Layers and locking of elements. I am constantly accidentally taping on a picture that has a note over top of it, only to have to move everything around to get the note on top again.

-Tags would be nice but definitely not make or break.

I truly love ElementNote, and the handwriting features here are better than any other app I’ve tried. This is the main feature that keeps me coming back, but there are a couple things that prevent me from using this as my main note-taking app. I’d love ElementNote even more if just a few things were changed/added:

1. It would be great to be able to scroll through a document one single page at a time (rather than the continuous scroll which is the only option right now). I like being able to focus on one page at a time, and seeing the edges of the 2 pages on either side of the one I am writing on feels distracting. This is one of the main things that keeps me from using ElementNote as my main note-taking app.

2. It would be nice to be able to add pictures with sharp corners (rather than rounded) or at least to have the option to choose whether pictures have sharp or rounded corners.

I really hope to see updates that include these features in the future, as I would love to use ElementNote for all my note-taking and digital planning needs. I think it has the potential to be truly great, and I would love to see that happen!

I must say that I absolutely love ElementNote, I have searched high and low and tried pretty much everything out there. The handwriting looks so good and I love how simplistic it is. The couple of things that I wish were different: I know that you have the option to search within your note for certain words, but mine does not seem to work. No matter what I type in, it does not seem to find anything I’ve written. Also, I really really wish the pen was as beautiful as the pencil. I don’t know why, but the pen doesn’t seem to be as comfortable to write with (it doesn’t make my handwriting look as nice)

Otherwise, super happy

I downloaded Element from recommendations ironically from the GoodNotes Reddit page. People raved about the pen choices and how your handwriting looks and they were right! And the stickers!! and the ability make your own sticker sheets is awesome. However, I’m hoping Element does do some upgrades such as: the ability to bookmark or favorite a page in a notebook. I know you can search which is great but for instance, I use it primarily for a digital planner which is over 700 pages and sometimes it’s difficult or otherwise takes time to find a particular page. I also kind of miss the ability to rearrange pages by selecting and dragging but that’s not a big deal. I also noticed some glitches in Element like it took some time to load when I opened a notebook. But I absolutely love writing more with Element. Which motivates me to write more so that part gets 5 stars. But I am hoping they add bookmarking or a timeline option, then ElementNote will be a ten star app!

Overall, element is a great app; I’ve recommended it to friends of mine. I especially love the one time payment. I’ve had ElementNote for over a year now mainly using it to takes notes for my college classes. However, some of my courses can get pretty heavy and I have taken some extensive notes. This past semester, I had an exam that I prepared 50 pages worth of notes (in a single file) on Element. I had a hard time scrolling through my notes to review things because ElementNote kept crashing. I’ve noticed this pattern happens on files that either A) Have a lot of writing/text/stickers/images, or B) The note file has 10+ pages. After ElementNote crashes, I have to give it at least a full minute to open it back up and have it running properly again. I’m not sure if this issue is specific with the way I take my notes, or if others have a similar experience, but I thought it was worth mentioning.

I have tried every note-taking app on ElementNote Store: Notability, Goodnotes, Noteshelf, CollaNote. I even used Apple Notes as my main note-taking app for a while. But, they all had their flaws in my opinion, whether it be lack of functionality, poor UI/UX, or difficult to use. BUT ElementNote… ElementNote IS EVERYTHING I’VE BEEN LOOKING FOR!!! It has a beautiful, simple UI, the most tools and functionality I’ve ever seen in a note-taking app, and is incredibly simple, smooth, and easy to use. I wish I had ElementNote sooner! I have nothing but great things to say about ElementNote and recommend to anyone looking for a note-taking app. ElementNote truly is…Elegant!

I never could find a notes app that I felt comfortable in. There are just too many issues to list here as to why they didn’t work. I had given up on using my iPad for my notebook. Then I got a random recommendation for ElementNote on YT…and, my whole world has been changed! The combination of the streamlined workspace and the incredible pen writing experience, has just blown me away!! Not to mention the ease of adding media and page editing. I have been writing daily and creating notes pages that fill me with creative glee!🥹 Thank you, this is what I have been searching for, for years!!!⭐️✨⭐️✨⭐️✨🥰

It’s incredible. Everything is fantastic, especially after the latest update. However, there’s something that deeply saddens me. 💔
Before the update, I could effortlessly switch between using the pen and eraser by simply double-tapping the Apple Pencil. But now, I have to press the pencil first, followed by a selection of pens, highlighters, and erasers. This process takes a bit more time compared to the previous method, which was incredibly convenient.
I’ve checked the settings, but there’s no option to revert to the double-tap feature. 💔
Please bring this feature back.

This is by far my favorite note-taking app I have used thus far for my iPad Pro. It is one of the only ones that even has (customizable) pen stabilization which put it at the top all by itself. All the UI is easy to navigate. My single gripe with Element Note so far has been the hyperlinking feature. Having found a variety of templates online to import into ElementNote , a lot of them have hyperlinked tabs and dates to bring you to a certain location within the notebook; the problem is the buttons only work correctly about 10% of the time. For example, I will click the “July” tab, and it will bring me to the monthly overview of July. After scrolling away from that page, I click the “July” tab again, but this time it brings me to some random date in September. From that point on the hyperlinks do not bring me to the desired location within the notebook. Happens on every template I try it with. Would love a fix for this!

I am really happy with ElementNote. It does crash sometimes, but since it syncs to the cloud, that doesn’t typically bother me too much and I am sure that will get fixed over time. I love that the interface is clean and simple. I never liked the goodnotes interface. It felt like it took the attention away from the pretty planner systems I wanted to use. Element is clean and minimal, while also being beautiful and simple. I really love the pencils in ElementNote. It feels much more natural to write in. I recently was thinking how nice it would be to have better digital stationary like in Apple notes or procreate, but in an app like this. Very happy that I discovered this beautiful gem!

Element is by far the most beautiful writing experience on iPad. I am a longtime GoodNotes & Notability user, however, ElementNote beats them by a margin when it comes to UI and Apple pencil ✏️ writing experience. I still use GoodNotes or Notability but if/when ElementNote adds more features like converting text, favorite pen colors, pencil to shape and other features, I will definitely switch over! Also, i did buy the lifetime deal which is a steal, by the way. However, I hope the developer reads this and thinks about a more sustainable business model because i think you’re charging too low for you what you have! Definitely try it and buy it if you’re in the market for a amazing app ;)

I’ve been looking for a satisfying note-taking/PDF markup app all day, and ElementNote mostly hits the nail on the head. There’s a couple glaring bugs, notably the eraser doesn’t register 100% and there’s a slight delay in the writing when quickly zooming/panning. But I’m still thinking of buying lifetime access to ElementNote because I’m sure the developer will iron out these issues. The fountain pen + gradient ink alone is enough reason for me to buy ElementNote. Try it out! UPDATE: I just replaced my Apple Pencil nib with a new one since I had previously dropped my pencil and it landed on the nib. I don’t know if it’s placebo, but the supposed bugs are now gone. The issues might have been hardware related. 100% get ElementNote!

The new update completely fixed all the concerns/bugs I was dealing with! It's back to being my favorite note-taking app ever

This was my favorite note taking app by far, and it still would be if it wasn’t for the fact that it keeps freezing every time I open it. I have had ElementNote for a few months and this issue hasn’t happened until recently, i have deleted it, redownloaded it, closed and opened it. It doesn't matter, it lets me write one thing and then it completely freezes and doesn't let me do anything besides close the tab. Again i can’t stress how much i love ElementNote when it works, it has all the features you could need in a note taking app, and has really good brush presets. I really hope it starts to work again soon

I got ElementNote mostly for the variety of pens and aesthetic design. I love all the variations and ability to note take very easily. Everything is easy to navigate and it’s my new favorite handwriting note taking app. However since ElementNote is still new, I am excited for the future features they will add! I also especially love the one time payment! It’s one of the main reasons I got it! I really didnt want a subscription and this was perfect!

Additions that could be helpful:
- I would like if ElementNote could please keep the page background color when exporting with Dark Mode rather than switch everything to light mode when exporting.
-More importantly: when i download a large pdf to take notes on it, it take a second for what I write to show up on the screen, which is reasonable. However, on other programs it does not lag. If this could be fixed I would really appreciate it.

For context I’m a student and take all my notes on iPad. So far, none of the typical note taking apps have really satisfied me at all, until I found ElementNote.

ElementNote has the best handwriting I’ve ever seen from the various note taking apps for iPad. My handwriting is so clear that I don’t need OCR to clean it up. It feels telepathic how well the words turn out the first try, I can finally just focus on writing and not worry about aesthetics. That said, ElementNote is missing features that I consider essential for my needs as a student. OCR, audio recording, auto shape lines, and those other nice to have features are absent. It’s unclear whether they will be added later although I hope they are. I’d personally love to see these features added or the ability to import my element notes to nebo and use their OCR and miscellaneous functions. I hope the developer considers the latter option as I could see it being a huge advantage over other apps.

I am an Apple Note user and am waiting for the 18 update. However, I only recently downloaded Element and have fallen in love with it. It is the easiest note taking app I have used, yet with the most sophisticated feel of any of them. It may become my go to note-taker from which I will export to Apple Note to store my work notes under one roof. Element is so well designed that it is hard to put down. I would love to see an audio note taker added with a transcript feature attached. That said, buy this one. It is near perfect.