Best Note Taking App For iPad, iPhone, And iPod Touch PhatPad

[PhilSynowiec]

[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6zKHaypgmDQ[/ame]​

PhatPad is an App I have been looking for as a college student. I have finally found a note taking App that suits me and can do whatever I need it to do. If you use your iPad for things like school and work, somewhere where you need to take notes, PhatPad should make it easy.

You start off with a clean sheet of paper and with that, as always, you can let your imagination run wild. Anywhere on your new document, you can draw, make graphs, add text, whatever you need. You can easily switch from drawing to typing, or even writing if you really wanted to.

Really great note taking App, I suggest you check it out below:
PhatPad for iPad on the iTunes App Store
PhatNotes for iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad on the iTunes App Store

 

[JohnMorris]

The Phat Pad is a new note taking application for iPhone and iPod Touch. It’s an easy solution for college and university students to create notes.

 

[Victguja]

I think it depends a lot on what kind of notes you take and your personal way to take notes.
I take a lot of notes daily by writing and drawing. I like handwriting and I am much faster then typing even with the iPad that is for sure slower than taking notes with ink on paper. The big advantage is that you can classify the notes and search in. I do not need often to copy/paste documents, pictures or else in my notes while I need a powerful classification system for my notes.

I use Note Taker HD and I find it excellent. It has a particular feature that allows you to write in a dedicated region of the screen and it goes automatically, in real time, on your page. This region can be set to advance automatically as you write or can be moved easily anywhere on page. This allows a very high density of information on page as you would have on a real paer sheet. I didn't find something similar in any other note taker that I tried. Another nice feature that I often use is that you can import a PDF and write notes on it and keep this classified together with all your other notes.

I tried Penultimate but it was not matching my need of filling in the page with as much notes as I would do on a paper sheet and the classification of the notes is weak. You can not have tags and searches based on tags. This is very powerful if you use to search for old notes after a time. You don't have to scroll everything to find what you need. The choice of colors and thicknesses is also poor. The write feeling is good but I wouldn' use it for taking notes.

 

[Heaviside]

My advice is to stY clear of phatpad. I just downloaded it, and it is filled with gee whiz stuff, but the palm protector doesn't work. Without it, you smudge the screen or try to write in an unnatural way.

If you just must have handwriting recognition, shape recognition, and audio notes, you might want to give it a try.

But for my money, Note Taker HD is the only one I have found that has seemingly designed with the day to day note taker's needs in mind. I have meen using it for a couple of months and love it.

 

[chowdown]

NTHD's design cleverly deals with two of the thorniest issues faced by the iPad note-taking apps: how to minimize unwanted marks being made by the writer's wrist/palm/little finger, and, how to help the user write smaller and more legibly without sacrificing user comfort.

The app Neu Notes solves those two problems just as well as NTHD, but in other ways. NN has brilliant palm-protection that actually works and is very well thought out. It has extremely smooth ink and is very easy to zoom in and out quickly. It can't import PDFS, but the app Neu Annotate does.

This all sounds like a bit of an ad. Sorry about that. I'm not affiliated etc...

 

[Tim SPRACKLEN]

I like Notes Plus. It allows handwriting and typing (and supports Bluetooth keyboards). The handwriting input is very easy, there's the 'palm support' feature (that is found in other note-taking apps) that let's you rest your palm on the screen while you're writing, but doesn't register your palm's touch in that area. Also, you can write with your fingers really large and it condenses the size of your handwriting to a more 'normal' (selectable) size, making it easy to write with fingers and not need a stylus. When writing in this 'large' mode, it constantly updates the 'reduced size text' and, as you get towards the edge of the screen on the right hand side (since you're writing large that will occur quite soon) it displays a 'box' just at the edge of the reduced size writing that you can return to and keep on writing. OK - I've not explained that at all well, but Search for Notes Plus in the App Store and then go to their support web site where they have some great videos that show how this works. Plus you can draw a whole range of free hand shapes and, with its shape recognition, it will 'tidy up' the shapes. It has a voice recording option too.

There are loads of other facilities too - it may be worth you checking it out.

The developer is really responsive; if you email him you actually get an answer!!

Tim
Scotland

 

[Hal05154]

I vote for Audionote.

I think it's best used with a keyboard.

Records lectures and timestamps when you write something in the note.

You can draw on it, and type under the drawing. Or freehand write.

note can be email when your done.

So far so good. I love it.

 

[zorah]

NTHD's design cleverly deals with two of the thorniest issues faced by the iPad note-taking apps: how to minimize unwanted marks being made by the writer's wrist/palm/little finger, and, how to help the user write smaller and more legibly without sacrificing user comfort.

The app Neu Notes solves those two problems just as well as NTHD, but in other ways. NN has brilliant palm-protection that actually works and is very well thought out. It has extremely smooth ink and is very easy to zoom in and out quickly. It can't import PDFS, but the app Neu Annotate does.

This all sounds like a bit of an ad. Sorry about that. I'm not affiliated etc...

They're both free anyway! I like them both too. For PDF annotation, I wouldn't have paid for Noterize as I think new Annotate does great, and gosh, is free! (but Noterize is good too, so I go back and forth).
I use neu Notes as well, and also have several paid note taking apps for variety, depending on what I am doing.

 

[jtrosky]

I've tried just about all of the note-taking apps and I've found these to be the best (at least for my needs):

AudioNote (my original favorite)
MentalNote (this replaced AudioNote for me)
Notability (my current favorite - this is now my default note-taking app)

All of these are mainly for typed-in notes, but also support audio recording/syncing, drawing/writing, etc... Notability supported bulleted lists, multiple fonts and font sizes, etc.. Pretty awesome stuff. I preferred the typed-in notes because they are searchable. Now, I can easily find that info I took notes on months ago!

 

[Hal05154]

I've tried just about all of the note-taking apps and I've found these to be the best (at least for my needs):

AudioNote (my original favorite)
MentalNote (this replaced AudioNote for me)
Notability (my current favorite - this is now my default note-taking app)

All of these are mainly for typed-in notes, but also support audio recording/syncing, drawing/writing, etc... Notability supported bulleted lists, multiple fonts and font sizes, etc.. Pretty awesome stuff. I preferred the typed-in notes because they are searchable. Now, I can easily find that info I took notes on months ago!

Would you be kind enought to explain why you switched to MentalNote and then Notability? Always looking for something better!

 

[jtrosky]

Would you be kind enought to explain why you switched to MentalNote and then Notability? Always looking for something better!

Sure... I just liked the look and feel of Mental Note a little better. But then I found Notability - It allows for many different fonts (on the same page), different font colors, sizes, etc... Also supported Outlines and bulleted lists, etc... As well as folders! Notability is bar far the best I've used!

 

[Justin Brock]

I would check out Notability as it supports all of your writing needs. It allows for completely customizable fonts, size, styles, colors, bullets, numbering, etc. You can also insert pictures, web images, and hand drawings such as graphs or anything conceivable. In addition, you can categorize your notes into simple search able files. Audio recordings can be synced and amplified with notes to help review everything. The notes can be exported as pdf+audio or simply as a pdf through drop box.

 

[Justin Brock]

Thank you for all of the feedback

Thank you to everyone providing feedback on note taking apps. A quick update on Notability:

Ginger Labs continues to update Notability with the most-requested features.

Notability 2.06 is a big update and includes these new features:

- RTF and RTFD file types to edit notes on a computer.
- iDisk and WebDAV backup and sharing services.
- Batch upload of all file types to online services and iTunes, as well as batch printing.

Here is a link for more information. Please do not hesitate to contact us with thoughts and suggestions. We love hearing from people. Notability for iPad on the iTunes App Store

 

[jenny10]

Looking for a solution that rivals One note. Ideally would import my existing one note notes.

Would like the ability to:
* write text, draw, include photos, audio.
* have multiple folders/notebooks however you term it
* search across notes, sections, folders, etc
* option of sharing notes
* sync possibly - either with a client on laptop or with one note

 

[Tim SPRACKLEN]

I've been using NotesPlus for a while and this seems to fit most of your requirements. The developer is very responsive to users' requests too and is constantly issuing updates that incorporate new features requested by users.

Tim
Scotland