Lockbook vs MarkWell
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
Lockbook
An end-to-end encrypted note-taking app for writing, sketching, and storing files. It offers real-time collaboration, offline support, and a polished Markdown editor, all while prioritizing user privacy and data security.
- End-to-end encryption
- Markdown editor
- Sketching
- File storage
- Real-time collaboration
- Offline support
- Open source
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Lockbook is an end-to-end encrypted notes app for writing, sketching, storing files, syncing across devices, and collaborating in real time. Your notes are encrypted before they leave your device, so even we can't read them. Lockbook is 100% open source: https://github.com/lockbook/lockbook Fast & Native: We built Lockbook for everyday use because we use Lockbook every day. Our native apps feel at home on every platform, with fast sync, offline support, and a polished Markdown editor for serious notes. Secure: Keep your thoughts to yourself. Lockbook encrypts your notes with keys generated on your devices. Only you and the people you share with can access your notes, folders, sketches, and files. Private: Know your customer? We sure don't. We don't collect your email, phone number, or name. We don't need a password. Lockbook is for people with better things to worry about than privacy. Collaborative: Share folders, edit notes together, and see live updates from collaborators without giving up end-to-end encryption. Open: Write in Markdown, sketch in SVG, and keep your work in formats you can actually use. Honest: Be the customer, not the product. We sell a note-taking app, not your data. Developer Friendly: The Lockbook CLI fits right into your favorite chain of piped-together Unix commands. Search your notes with fzf, edit them with vim, and schedule backups with cron. When scripting doesn't cut it, use our Rust library for a robust programmatic interface. Website: https://lockbook.net Terms of Service: https://lockbook.net/tos License Agreement: https://www.apple.com/legal/internet-services/itunes/dev/stdeula/ Privacy Policy: https://lockbook.net/privacy-policy
MarkWell
A native bookmark manager for Mac, iPhone, and iPad that syncs bookmarks across devices using iCloud. Organize links with tags and save them from any app via the system share sheet. Prioritizes user privacy with no account or analytics.
- Save links from any app
- Organize with tags, not folders
- End-to-end iCloud sync
- Privacy-first design
- Fetch title and favicon automatically
- Offline functionality
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MarkWell is a native bookmark manager for Mac, iPhone, and iPad. Save links from anywhere, organize them with tags, and find them again later — across all your devices, with no separate account to manage. SAVE FROM ANYWHERE Share any URL from Safari, Mail, Messages, or any other app, straight into MarkWell using the system share sheet. The app fetches the page's title and favicon for you, so the bookmark looks right the moment it lands. TAGS, NOT FOLDERS Tag a link with as many ideas as it has. Filter the sidebar by tag to find things by mood, topic, or project — whatever sticks in your head. No nested folders to maintain, no rigid structure to fight against. IN YOUR MENU BAR On the Mac, MarkWell can run from the menu bar instead of the Dock. Its menu adds a bookmark, brings the window back, and quits — or set a single click on the icon to open New Bookmark straight away. SYNCED THROUGH YOUR OWN ICLOUD Bookmarks sync end-to-end through your own iCloud account using Apple's CloudKit framework. There is no MarkWell account, no MarkWell server, and no analytics. Your data stays under your Apple ID, and the same bookmark you save on your iPhone shows up on your Mac a few seconds later. BRING YOUR BROWSER BOOKMARKS Import the bookmarks file that Safari, Chrome, Firefox, Edge, or Vivaldi exports. Folders become tags, so the way you sorted things comes with you, and duplicates are flagged before they land. Export your library any time — as JSON for a complete MarkWell backup, or as a standard bookmarks file any browser can import. PRIVACY-FIRST MarkWell collects nothing. The only network call the app makes on its own is to read the title and favicon of a URL when you save it. There are no third-party SDKs, no advertising, no telemetry. The privacy policy at bendansby.com/apps/markwell/privacy.html spells it out in detail. REQUIREMENTS - Mac running macOS 14 Sonoma or later - iPhone or iPad running iOS / iPadOS 17 or later - Optional: iCloud account for cross-device sync (works fully offline without one) Feedback welcome — ben.dansby@gmail.com.
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is price: Lockbook at Free against MarkWell's $9.99. Lockbook also leads on ratings volume (13 vs 1). MarkWell's advantage is in-app purchases (none vs 1) and iOS requirement (17.0 vs 26.0). On rating, review sentiment, update cadence and ads 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
Lockbook is free to download; MarkWell costs $9.99 up front. Lockbook sells 1 in-app purchase, starting at $2.99 per month. MarkWell asks for nothing beyond the download.
On the App Store both sit at effectively the same score — 5.0 for Lockbook against 5.0 for MarkWell. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: Lockbook has 13 ratings behind it against 1, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews split almost evenly too, at 100% and 100% positive.
Lockbook ships an update weekly, MarkWell every 2 weeks. The most recent releases landed on November 7, 2026 and November 5, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | Lockbook | MarkWell |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free — better | $9.99 |
| Rating | 5.0 (13 ratings) | 5.0 (1 ratings) |
| Positive reviews | 100.0% of reviews | 100.0% of reviews |
| Number of ratings | 13 — better | 1 |
| Update frequency | Weekly — better | Every 2 weeks |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | Yes | No — better |
| Monetization | Free with in-app purchases — better | Paid |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad, Mac | iPhone, iPad, Mac |
| Requires iOS | 26.0 | 17.0 — better |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 136 MB | 6 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | Lockbook LLC | Benjamin Dansby |
Customer experience
Lockbook
MarkWell
In-app purchases
Lockbook
- 30GB$2.991 Month
MarkWell
No in-app purchases









