The best note-taking apps in 2026

Obsidian is the note app we would install when the notes have to outlive the app. Notes are plain Markdown files in a folder on your device, so you can open them in any editor or copy the folder if you leave. The core app is free on iPhone, Android, Mac, Windows, and Linux, with no note or device cap, no account wall, and no ads. Wiki links, backlinks, a local graph, Canvas, and community plugins sit on top of that folder. It suits people who keep long notes, link ideas together, and use phones with a Windows or Mac computer.

Sync and Publish are paid add-ons on obsidian.md, not in the App Store or on Google Play. Sync Standard is $4 per user per month billed yearly, or $5 month to month (one vault, 1 GB, 5 MB file cap). Sync Plus is $8 billed yearly, or $10 month to month (ten vaults, 10 GB upgradable to 100 GB, 200 MB file cap). Publish is $8 per site per month billed yearly, or $10 month to month (obsidian.md, October 2026). Free sync through iCloud Drive, Syncthing, or Git is possible and can be flaky on phones. Mixing an iPhone with a Windows PC is where paid Sync earns its price. Setup takes real time, and the phone app often loads the whole vault before you can type, so capture is slower than Bear or Google Keep. Shared Sync vaults allow up to 20 people, each on Sync, with no live cursors. Pick Apple Notes or Google Keep for short memos on one set of devices.

Notes you keep as files

Every note is a Markdown file in a local vault folder. Offline editing works without a plan, and leaving means copying the folder. Wiki links, backlinks, Canvas, and Bases (local database-style views over note properties) cover linked thinking without a hosted workspace. Community plugins number in the thousands. Quality and upkeep vary, and a heavy plugin set slows the phone app at launch.

What Obsidian Sync costs

The App Store and Play apps are free downloads. Sync Standard is $48 a year at the yearly rate, Sync Plus is $96 a year, and Publish is $96 a year per site, all from obsidian.md in October 2026. Sync uses AES-256 end-to-end encryption, selective sync for media, and version history. Free folder sync remains an option if you accept more setup and more sync clashes.

Who should skip Obsidian

Skip it if you want a note open in under a second for a shopping list. Skip it if a team needs live cursors, comments, and roles on the same page. Skip it if you refuse any setup and want folders and rich text without learning Markdown. Apple Notes, Google Keep, or Notion handle those jobs better.

Apple Notes is enough for most people who only use Apple devices. It is free, already on every iPhone, iPad, and Mac, and syncs through iCloud. You get folders, tags, smart folders, links between notes, checklists, a document scanner, locked notes, collaboration on a shared note, and Math Notes for equations typed or handwritten on supported devices. It suits a household that stays on Apple hardware and wants capture that opens from the Lock Screen or Control Center.

There is no Android app. On a Windows PC the path is iCloud.com in a browser, which is fine for reading and light edits and weak as a daily desk. Free iCloud storage is 5 GB shared with photos, backups, and iCloud Drive, so a photo-heavy library can push Notes into a paid iCloud+ plan. Export is thin: you can share or save a note as a PDF, one note at a time, with no bulk Markdown dump. Handwriting and sketches stay in Apple's format. Move on when you need a portable Markdown folder (Obsidian), when anyone in the house uses Android (Google Keep or Obsidian), or when notes are a team wiki with databases (Notion).

Google Keep is the free sticky-note app for Android users, and it also runs on iPhone and the web. Capture is the point: short notes, checklists, voice notes with transcripts on supported devices, photo notes, and search that finds text inside images. Labels and colors replace folders. It suits people who mix an Android phone with an iPhone or a Windows PC and want grocery lists and reminders without learning a new system.

There is no native desktop app beyond the browser at keep.google.com. Keep has no rich long-document editor and no nested folders. Storage counts against the Google account's free 15 GB shared with Gmail and Drive. Location reminders were removed when Keep reminders moved into Google Tasks in late 2025 and early 2026. Date-and-time reminders remain through Tasks and Calendar. Leaving means Google Takeout: the archive is a ZIP of HTML and JSON per note plus attachments, not a ready Markdown vault. Move on when notes turn into long linked writing (Obsidian), when you need databases and shared wikis (Notion), or when you only use Apple devices and want deeper folders (Apple Notes).

Bear is for writers on iPhone, iPad, and Mac who want Markdown that looks like a finished document. Nested tags replace folders, wiki links and backlinks cover a personal wiki, and hide-Markdown editing keeps the markup out of sight while you write. Typography and themes are why people stay. It is Apple-only: no Android or Windows app, with Bear Web still a public browser beta.

Free covers unlimited local notes on one device, nested tags, tables, sketches, document scanning, and export to TXT, Markdown, TextBundle, and RTF. Bear Pro is $2.99 a month or $29.99 a year in the US App Store (October 2026), with a 7-day trial on the FAQ (App Store copy also lists 14 days). Pro adds iCloud sync across every Apple device on the same Apple ID, per-note password encryption, Face or Touch ID lock, OCR search inside images and PDFs, extra themes, and export to HTML, DOCX, PDF, JPG, and ePub. Notes live in a local SQLite database, so the vault is not a portable Markdown folder the way Obsidian is. Anyone with an Android phone or a Windows PC should choose Obsidian or Notion instead.

Notion is the pick when notes are shared with other people, or when the same workspace needs databases for projects, reading lists, or a light CRM. Native apps cover iPhone, Android, Mac, and Windows, plus a full web client, so a mixed team can work in one place. It is a workspace first and a quick note app second.

Solo Free includes unlimited pages and blocks for one member, databases, 10 guests, 7-day page history, and uploads capped at 5 MB each. A Free workspace with two or more members hits a block cap. Plus is $10 per member per month billed yearly, or $12 month to month on notion.com (October 2026), and lifts collaborative blocks, file size, history to 30 days, and guests. Full Notion AI sits on Business at $20 per member per month billed yearly. Offline works in the apps only, page by page on Free. In our testing the mobile apps were slow to open and laggy to type, so quick capture belongs in Google Keep or the phone's own notes app. Workspace export is HTML or Markdown and CSV on paid plans. Layout often breaks when you leave.