# PaperShip - Mendeley & Zotero — user reviews > 613 indexed App Store user reviews of PaperShip by shazino, rated 4.00/5 from 921 ratings. - Source: https://appshunter.io/ios/app/papership-mendeley-and-zotero/id631980748/reviews - App overview in markdown: https://appshunter.io/ios/app/papership-mendeley-and-zotero/id631980748.md - Rating breakdown: 5★ 499 · 4★ 192 · 3★ 56 · 2★ 38 · 1★ 136 ## What do users think of PaperShip? Overall sentiment: negative **Pros** - 👍 Efficient app for reading and annotating PDFs - 🚀 Seamless sync with Zotero/Mendeley libraries - 💡 Useful annotation and highlighting tools - 🔍 Altmetrics integration for quick reference impact **Cons** - 🐛 Sync issues with Zotero/Mendeley, leading to lost annotations - 🔒 Lack of customer support and abandoned development - 💰 Expensive in-app purchase for annotation features - 🔍 Subpar search and organization capabilities compared to desktop apps **Commonly reported bugs** - Frequent crashes and freezes - Inability to import PDFs from external sources - Annotations not syncing or disappearing - Inconsistent behavior across iOS devices **Most requested features** - Improved annotation tools with Apple Pencil support - Ability to manage folders and collections within the app - Bidirectional sync of annotations with Zotero/Mendeley - Dark mode and other customization options ## Newest reviews (14 of 613) ### 3/5 — Annotations *2025-06-21, version 3.8.5* Please let us do annotation in app also ### 3/5 — Was the app abandoned? *2025-06-04, version 3.8.5* After Mendeley being excluded from the App Store for iPhone and iPad, I’ve been searching for something to replace it. PaperShip is ok, but got some long standing issues that are not being addressed for years. ### 3/5 — Why highlight not appearing in the application *2025-01-24, version 3.8.5* Dear Developer, I hope this email finds you well. I am writing to inquire about an issue I am experiencing with the highlight feature in your application, paperShip . It seems that the highlight feature is not appearing or reflecting as expected as in Mendele ### 1/5 — Papership will NOT sync annotations with Mendeley *2025-01-09, version 3.8.5* If you're getting this app to make annotations on a PDF through the Papership app and have it sync to Mendeley, it will NOT. Would not recommend buying the annotation package either since it doesn't sync them. I emailed customer service weeks ago about this and never got a response. This app has great potential but unfortunately it is not taken care of by the producers of the app. ### 4/5 — Doesn’t work w/ Zotero *2025-01-08, version 3.8.5* Thanks for this great app. It’s amazing w/ mendeley. But can’t log in w/ zotero. Pls fiiiix it. Tnx ### 1/5 — Cannot Sync Zotero *2024-12-15, version 3.8.5* I was excited to try this app but it will not sync with my Zotero. I reached out to support and will adjust my rating if we are about to troubleshoot this. ### 1/5 — Uygulama çalışmıyor *2024-11-28, version 3.8.5* Uygulamayı açtığım gibi kendini kapatıyor ### 3/5 — Sharing problems *2024-10-26, version 3.8.5* Great for mobile uploads if PdF but for some reason when I share, it attaches the incorrect pdf. So useless to share with colleagues. Otherwise really happy with app ### 1/5 — Duplicate Docs Issue /Mendeley *2024-09-15, version 3.8.5* I like the app. But can the developer please at least attend to the issue that leads to the creation of duplicates of documents on Mendeley, please??? I have had enough of seeing 3+ copies of the documents I read on Papership. I don’t want fancy updates or anything like that; this bug has been a major issue for my workflow and needs an immediate solution. ### 1/5 — Not synching with mendeley *2024-09-07, version 3.8.5* I’m very frustrated with this app right now and am hoping someone can help me. I sent an email to the help center and would be happy to change my review if this gets remedied. My annotations and highlights do not transfer over when I open the article in mendeley. Furthermore I cannot access the notes I took when I go back to them on my iPad. The app prompts me to purchase the annotation bundle every time even though I have purchased it already, as evidenced by the note icon showing I took a note but cannot open now. I really hope this can get addressed since I think if it works as it’s described in here it would be very useful to me. Unfortunately that has not been my experience thus far. ### 1/5 — Annotations on pdfs do not sync to account *2024-08-29, version 3.8.5* I paid £9.99 to have annotations available on the app. However, they do not sync to my mendeley account, which is pointless. I can’t have a seamless experience between the two. Wish I could get my money back. ### 1/5 — Pésimo *2024-08-21, version 3.8.5* Pague por la app para mi ipad y si quiero utilizarla en mi mac y iphone para hacer anotaciones debo pagar por cada dispositivo. Me comuniqué on soporte y ni siquiera contestan. Perdida de dinero ### 3/5 — Fab to have iPad support *2024-08-19, version 3.8.5* As others say it would be amazing to have annotations with ocr for searching our own keywords ### 4/5 — The only app option for Mendeley *2024-08-15, version 3.8.5* I purchased the paid version of this app. It’s just a few dollars. Worth the purchase. I have been using Mendeley for decades and it’s so~ frustrating that they decided to give up the Mendeley app. PaperShip is the only choice I have to read Mendeley papers. Mendeley reference manger in Safari doesn’t work in iPad! Please keep updating Papership. I am willing to pay for the updated version. Thank you! ## Most critical reviews (10 lowest-rated) ### 1/5 — Login Issues with Zotero *2026-03-31, version 3.8.5* Ipad version of this app no longer works with zotero, as it has not incorporated the captcha part of the login and any attempts to login will be rejected due to never having the ability to solve the captcha. ### 1/5 — Worst thing ever *2026-01-11, version 3.8.5* Too expensive and syncing process is very bad, I will use zotero ### 1/5 — Does not work with Zotero *2025-10-15, version 3.8.5* It seems as though the “OAuth” handshake with zotero does not work anymore. Do not download if you want to sync with zotero. ### 1/5 — Terrible login UI *2025-07-25, version 3.8.5* Not sure whom to blame for making it downright impossible to login into zotero. But if you can’t manage that then what’s the point of this app ### 1/5 — Unusable anymore *2025-07-23, version 3.8.5* I tried to open my Zotero library, using PaperShip, but then it said to open Safari to grant PaperShip access to my Zotero library, which I did. The Settings indicated that an access key had been created for PaperShip, yet the app was unable to access my Zotero library. The app hasn’t had updates for years. In the meantime, Zotero has released an iOS app that works fine. Farewell, PaperShip! ### 1/5 — Ya no funciona con Zotero *2025-06-06, version 3.8.5* Después de más de cinco años sin actualizarse, pasó lo inevitable… Ya no es posible entrar a la cuenta de Zotero. Fue muy buena aplicación en su momento, sin embargo, ya no es recomendable. ### 1/5 — can’t login with zotero *2025-05-26, version 3.8.5* failed at the very first step ### 1/5 — Would discourage anyone from using this app *2025-04-09, version 3.8.5* I would highly discourage anyone from using this app. The app has bugs and there is no support for the app. I realize that a year worth of my academic work is down the drain and it is scary to trust the app with further research output. ### 1/5 — Ücretli üyeliğim artık çalışmıyor *2025-02-22, version 3.8.5* Uygulamayı dijital arşiv olarak kullanıyordum Ücretli üyelik almıştım ama telefon değişikliği nedeniyle hiç bir şekilde giriş yapamıyorum kullanıcı adımı kabul etmiyor bu yüzden dosyalarıma ulaşamıyorum ### 1/5 — No longer works for new connections to Zotero *2025-01-09, version 3.8.5* App has been abandoned by dev and the API key process no longer functions. Do not purchase. It used to be very good but alas, tis no more ## Most praised reviews (10 highest-rated) ### 5/5 — 다소 버그가 있지만 작성한 annotation이 mendeley 앱과 호환되는 점이 이 어플이 가진 최고의 장점입니다. *2025-06-13, version 3.8.5* 업데이트가 된지 오래되어 다소 버그가 있지만 제목의 목적을 위해서는 아직 papership의 대체제가 없습니다. 한번씩 멘델레이 앱과 동기화 오류가 발생하여 papership을 새로고침할때마다 멘델레이 앱에 논문이 계속 복제되는 문제가 발생하긴 하는데 papership을 재로그인 하면 해결되긴합니다. ### 5/5 — Great! *2025-03-08, version 3.8.5* Love it, works smoothly, and perfect synchro with mendeley. ### 5/5 — Efficient *2025-02-18, version 3.8.5* Took a while to understand how to work around the app. However, afterwards the ability to pull up any reference with notes at the hand of your fingerprints was exceptional! ### 5/5 — Buena app *2025-01-21, version 3.8.5* Siento que es muy útil al momento de resaltar y me gusta que tenga la sincronización automática con mendeley, es un excelente organizador y lector para tus documentos. En lo personal lo utilizo más para lo académico. ### 5/5 — Review *2024-10-02, version 3.8.5* One of the best app….. go for it ### 5/5 — Best (only?) annotator that syncs w/ mendeley *2024-08-24, version 3.8.5* This app is really great for reading and annotating articles through mendeley (and probably zotero too). Any annotations made in the app are synced with the original document and pdf. I still refer to older documents I’ve marked up ten years ago, which is a huge time saver. Can also be used to mark up older scanned images. I and haven’t found any other app that can do all of that. The app stopped working for a few years, but now it seems up and running smoothly. Best $10 I ever spent! ### 5/5 — Make highlighting opacity persistent like color *2024-05-31, version 3.8.5* Great application. I use it all the time. I just wish highlighting opacity was persistent like color. I like 25% opacity but I have to set each time I highlight any text. Please consider fixing in future versions. ### 5/5 — Great research paper review app for the money *2024-05-27, version 3.8.5* I have been using this app for over 3 years with iPad and mac. One of the greatest features of this application is that the developer doesn’t limit platforms, though the mac version is on sale. So, I can install this iPad app on my Apple silicon mac without additional payment. I had a trouble with restoring annotation function when I updated my iPad to 13 inch. It looks like the purchase linked with the country where you buy this pack. If you have multiple apple IDs, you have to uninstall it once and change your country where you bought, install and restore the function again. I can see some customers had the same trouble. I hope this could help them. ### 5/5 — Increible *2024-04-01, version 3.8.5* Una gran organizador. Altamente recomendado. ### 5/5 — Excelente *2024-02-01, version 3.8.5* Muy buen aplicativo, de mucha utilidad, solo faltaría que este pueda conectarse con documentos (Office) y se pueda citar --- *Data collected daily from the US App Store and indexed by [AppsHunter](https://appshunter.io/). User reviews are verbatim App Store reviews. Ratings, prices and chart positions refresh continuously; this snapshot is from 2026-07-03.*