Comparison

Standard Notes vs NoteSS

Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.

Head to head
About

Standard Notes

Securely capture and sync your thoughts across all devices with end-to-end encryption. This app offers a simple, lasting place for all your notes, from personal thoughts to sensitive information, with robust privacy features.

Highlights
  • End-to-end encryption
  • Cross-device syncing
  • Offline access
  • Passcode and biometric lock
  • Tagging system
  • Open-source code
  • Optional productivity editors and themes
Features
Read full description

Standard Notes is a private and secure end-to-end encrypted notes app. It allows you to write and sync your notes across all your devices, including your iPhone, iPad, Mac, and web browser. Private means your notes are end-to-end encrypted, so only you can read your notes. Even we can't read the contents of your notes. Simple means it does one job and does it well. Standard Notes is a safe and lasting place for your life's work. Our focus is making it easy to write notes wherever you are and syncing them with encryption to all your devices. Our users love us for: • Personal Notes • Tasks & Todos • Passwords & Keys • Code & Technical Procedures • Private Journal • Meeting Notes • Cross-platform Scratchpad • Books, Recipes, & Movies • Health & Fitness Log Standard Notes comes free with: • Seamless sync across all your devices, with easy to use applications on iPhone, iPad, Mac, web browsers, and other platforms. • Offline access, so you can access your downloaded notes even without a connection. • No limit on number of devices. • No limit on number of notes. • Passcode lock protection, along with Touch ID and Face ID protection. • A tagging system to organize your notes (like #work, #ideas, #passwords, #crypto). • The ability to pin, lock, protect, and move notes to trash, which allows you to recover deleted notes until the trash is emptied. Standard Notes is completely open-source, which means when we say your notes are encrypted with industry-leading XChaCha-20 encryption, and that only you can read your notes, you don't have to take our word for it. Our code is open to the world to audit. We made Standard Notes simple because longevity is important to us. We want to make sure we're here, protecting your notes, for the next hundred years. You shouldn't have to find a new notes app every year. To sustain our development, we offer optional paid subscriptions which give you access to powerful tools like: • Productivity editors (like Markdown, Code, Spreadsheets) • Beautiful themes (like Midnight, Focus, Solarized Dark) • Powerful cloud tools including daily backups of your encrypted data delivered to your email inbox every day, or backed up to your cloud provider (like Dropbox and Google Drive). We're always happy to talk, whether it be a question, thought, or issue. Please feel free to email us any time at help@standardnotes.com. When you take the time to send us a message, we'll be sure to do the same. EULA: https://www.apple.com/legal/internet-services/itunes/dev/stdeula/

About

NoteSS

Read full description

Transform your screenshot chaos into an organized, searchable library. NoteSS is the AI-powered screenshot manager that finally makes your screenshots actually useful. NEVER LOSE A SCREENSHOT AGAIN Stop endless scrolling through your Photos app. NoteSS automatically reads, understands, and organizes every screenshot you take. Find that restaurant menu, receipt, or important conversation in seconds. POWERFUL AI FEATURES - Instant OCR – Extract all text from screenshots automatically - Smart AI Search – Find notepad based on the content, not just with keywords - AI Text Cleanup – Remove clutter and get clean, readable text - Smart Titles – AI generates meaningful titles for every screenshot - Auto-Categorization – Automatically tagged as Finance, Social, Work, Design, and more PRIVACY YOU CAN TRUST Your screenshots stay yours. NoteSS processes data on-device whenever possible, and all cloud processing is encrypted. We never use your data for training or share it with third parties. SEAMLESS SYNC Capture on your iPhone, search on your iPad, organize on your Mac. Your screenshot library syncs seamlessly across all your devices with iCloud. FREE TO START - Basic organization and categorization - Essential search features - On-device OCR NOTESS PRO Unlock unlimited potential: - Unlimited AI requests - Priority support - Custom themes - Batch processing - Smart folders PERFECT FOR - Receipts and invoices - Restaurant menus and recipes - Social media posts and memes - Work conversations and emails - Design inspiration - Article snippets - Anything you screenshot! Stop letting valuable information get lost in your camera roll. Download NoteSS and turn your screenshots into a powerful, searchable knowledge base. Privacy Policy: e3li.dev/notess/privacy Terms of Service: e3li.dev/notess/terms Support: support@e3li.dev Terms of Use: https://www.apple.com/legal/internet-services/itunes/dev/stdeula/

Screenshots

Standard Notes4 screens
NoteSS4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is iOS requirement: Standard Notes at 15.1 against NoteSS's 17.0. On price, update cadence, ads and in-app purchases there is nothing between them.

Scored on Price · Rating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings · Update frequency · Ads · In-app purchases · Monetization · Best chart rank · Devices · Requires iOS

CostPrice · In-app purchases · Ads · Monetization

Both are free to download. Standard Notes sells 1 in-app purchase, starting at $119.99 per year and NoteSS sells 2 in-app purchases, starting at $12.99 per month. Whichever you choose, the download price is not the number that matters.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

Standard Notes ships an update every 5 weeks, NoteSS every 2 weeks. The most recent releases landed on October 14, 2026 and October 4, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard1 real difference · 9 level
Standard Notes versus NoteSS: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterStandard NotesNoteSS
PriceFreeFree
Rating4.7 (3.8K ratings) — better—
Positive reviews64.1% of reviews—
Number of ratings3.8K — better—
Update frequencyEvery 5 weeksEvery 2 weeks — better
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesYesYes
MonetizationFree with in-app purchases—
DevicesiPhone, iPad, iPodiPhone, iPad, Mac
Requires iOS15.1 — better17.0
Further details — not scored
Size92 MB11 MB
Age rating4+4+
DeveloperStandard Notes Ltd.Nathalie Magno

Bugs and requests

Standard Notes

Reported bugs

4 issues
  • Notes disappearing or getting deleted unexpectedly
  • Sync issues between devices
  • Keyboard and UI bugs on mobile
  • Compatibility problems with older iOS versions

Requested features

5 requests
  • Add support for images and attachments
  • Implement a more robust search function
  • Introduce a dark mode option
  • Allow for better note organization (folders, nested tags)
  • Add undo/redo functionality

NoteSS

Not enough reviews yet to summarise bugs or requests.

In-app purchases

1 purchases

Standard Notes

Subscriptions1
  • Professional Plan7 Days trial$119.991 Year
2 purchases

NoteSS

Subscriptions2
  • NoteSS Pro - Monthly$12.991 Month
  • NoteSS Pro - Annual$59.991 Year

Questions

Is Standard Notes free?
Standard Notes is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Is NoteSS free?
NoteSS is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Do Standard Notes or NoteSS have ads?
Neither Standard Notes nor NoteSS shows ads.
Which is updated more often, Standard Notes or NoteSS?
Standard Notes ships an update every 5 weeks, and NoteSS every 2 weeks. Most recently, Standard Notes was updated on October 14, 2026 and NoteSS on October 4, 2026.

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