HotNotes vs Readonly
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
HotNotes
Organize your daily tasks and appointments with a stylish and intuitive note-taking app. Create to-do lists, break down tasks into smaller steps, and set reminders for important events. No sign-in is required to start planning your life.
- Daily to-do lists
- Task breakdown
- Shapes tool for drawing
- Elegant design
- Appointment planning
- Daily diary creation
- Event reminders
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• Write daily to-do lists and mark tasks as completed Your basic building block is the almighty To-Do—each a small step toward a great accomplishment. You can add notes, schedule it, and break it down into smaller steps. Features - Draw perfect shapes and lines with shapes tool - enjoy an elegant and eye-pleasing design - plan appointments and set up a stylish agenda - write daily to-do lists and mark tasks as completed - take notes for every day and create a diary - reminders for important events, tasks or notes - no sign-in or registration necessary
Readonly
Save articles from other apps to read later in a comfortable, distraction-free environment. Organize your saved content with tags, highlight key passages, and add notes for deeper comprehension. Customize the reading experience with various themes and layout adjustments.
- Quickly save articles from other apps
- Highlight text and add notes
- Organize articles with tags
- Customize reading themes and layout
- Synchronize data via iCloud
- Export articles in Markdown format
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"Readonly" is a simple and easy to use read later app. There are not too many complicated features, just to give you a comfortable place to read your saved articles. Featured Functions - Highlight & Notes While reading, use different colors to highlight text, mark key points for easy review later. You can also add notes to the highlights, recording your thoughts and insights, making each reading session more rewarding. - Theme Switching We have carefully prepared some themes suitable for reading, choose your favorite from it, relax your eyes and focus on reading. - iCloud Synchronization Data synchronization to the cloud, no longer worry about data loss. - Tag Management Tag articles, categorize and manage them, keep everything in order. - Layout Adjustment Select fonts, adjust spacing, you can finely control the layout of the article to make reading more comfortable. - Quick Save Quickly save articles in other apps through sharing operations. - Export Articles Export your saved articles in Markdown format. —————————— Contact Us: brkchen@icloud.com
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is review sentiment: Readonly at 100% against HotNotes's 0%. Readonly also leads on rating (4.4 vs 3.5) and update cadence (every 3 weeks vs every 28 months). HotNotes's advantage is in-app purchases (none vs 2). On price, ratings volume, ads and device support 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
Both are free to download. Readonly sells 2 one-off in-app purchases. HotNotes asks for nothing beyond the download.
Readonly holds the better App Store score, 4.4 against 3.5. Both are backed by a comparable volume of ratings — 6 and 16 respectively. Written reviews point the same way: 0% of HotNotes's written reviews are positive against 100% of Readonly's.
HotNotes ships an update every 28 months, Readonly every 3 weeks. The most recent releases landed on October 21, 2026 and October 24, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | HotNotes | Readonly |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free |
| Rating | 3.5 (6 ratings) | 4.4 (16 ratings) — better |
| Positive reviews | 0.0% of reviews | 100.0% of reviews — better |
| Number of ratings | 6 | 16 — better |
| Update frequency | Every 28 months | Every 3 weeks — better |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | No — better | Yes |
| Monetization | Free — better | Free with in-app purchases |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad | iPhone, iPad, Mac — better |
| Requires iOS | 17.0 | 16.0 — better |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 5 MB | 9 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | Samsuddin Ahmed Sohag | 龙 陈 |
Customer experience
HotNotes
Readonly
In-app purchases
HotNotes
No in-app purchases
Readonly
- Permanent Purchase(iOS)$2.99
- 永久购买(macOS)$2.99









