Microsoft OneNote vs Blankbook
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
Microsoft OneNote
Capture thoughts, ideas, and plans in a digital notepad. Organize, search, and secure your notes, memos, and sketches. Sync across devices for access anywhere, anytime. Collaborate with others on shared notepads.
- Capture thoughts and ideas
- Digital sketchbook
- Organize and search notes
- Sync notes via OneDrive
- Collaborate on shared notepads
- Handwritten notes and drawings
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Supercharge your productivity with OneNote. Organize thoughts and ideas, and simplify planning important moments with your digital note-taking. Smart notes on your phone can sync across all your devices with Microsoft OneNote. Combine the power of digital ink with the natural feel of a pen to help you sketch out your inspirations. Take smart notes and capture every detail with voice transcription. Our writing tools make it easy to capture your notes, review your content later, and access AI studying. Take smart notes, share writing ideas, organize note-taking, and collaborate on your creative ideas and writing - all with Microsoft OneNote. ONENOTE APP FEATURES: AI-POWERED COPILOT NOTEBOOKS • Make sense of your files with AI chat • Summarize meetings, classes, and discussions easily from your notes • Listen to audio overviews, created directly from the notes you take AI NOTE-TAKING WITH HOMEPAGE AND QUICK CAPTURE • Streamlined writing: Find notes from your connected accounts in one place to easily create, find, & act on your notes. Now with Samsung Notes integration. • AI workflows with Copilot: Capture text, voice, ink or images to your notepad with Quick Capture • Smart notes: Capture smart notes in ink. Click the pen button & write down thoughts • Write smart notes, draw & clip things from the web to add to your writing notebook SCAN PICTURES & EXTRACT TEXT FROM WRITING • Note-Taking Scanner: Scan documents, pictures, or files to extract writing • Capture images to extract text from documents & more • Apply different filters to change colors, add ink, crop images & more SMART NOTES & AUDIO TRANSCRIPTION • Voice smart notes: Take accurate notes with voice dictation • Click the Mic button to record, then click it again to end recording & save the file • Dictate smart notes in 27 languages (note some languages are in preview) & use Auto-Punctutation to format NOTE-TAKING THAT HELPS YOU ACHIEVE MORE • Organize writing using to-do lists, follow-up items, marks for what’s important & custom labels • Use OneNote as a notebook, journal or a notepad for work or AI studying • Notepad badge hovers on screen & lets you quickly write your thoughts down any time • NEW Sticky notes - Make quick memos & note-taking COLLABORATE WRITING & SHARE SMART NOTES • Write meeting notes, brainstorm projects, & draw attention to important points • Take notes & save ideas across your favorite devices, no matter what device your team likes to use BETTER TOGETHER WITH MICROSOFT OFFICE • OneNote is part of the Office family & works great with your favorite apps, such as Excel or Word, to help you do more Write notes, save ideas & keep up with your to-do list with Microsoft OneNote. APP REQUIREMENTS: OneNote is free on iPhone and many other devices. Get started today! Download OneNote and sign in with your Microsoft Account or the account assigned to you by your work or school. Monthly Microsoft 365 subscriptions purchased from the app will be charged to your App Store account and will automatically renew within 24 hours prior to the end of the current subscription period unless auto-renewal is disabled beforehand. You can manage your subscriptions in your App Store account settings. This app is provided by either Microsoft or a third-party app publisher and is subject to a separate privacy statement and terms and conditions. Data provided through the use of this store and this app may be accessible to Microsoft or the third-party app publisher, as applicable, and transferred to, stored, and processed in the United States or any other country where Microsoft or the app publisher and their affiliates or service providers maintain facilities. Please refer to the Microsoft Software License Terms for Microsoft 365. See “License Agreement” link under Information. By installing the app, you agree to these terms and conditions.
Blankbook
Experience a natural handwriting feel on an infinite canvas. Organize notes with a visual bookshelf and access tools quickly. Offers various paper types and intuitive controls for seamless creativity.
- Infinite scrolling canvas
- 7 static paper types (dark/light variants)
- Pen, pencil, marker, lasso, ruler, erasers
- Three quick-access tool slots
- Intuitive gesture controls
- Automatic dark mode matching system settings
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Blankbook reduces the clutter and reproduce the essence of an extraordinary handwriting experience. It features a well-thought design that makes your content speak. The bookshelf offers a see-through preview that allows you to see your content directly. Canvas: Infinite scrolling canvas allows your creativity flow, you’ll never be bothered by manually creating a new page over and over again. Paper: It offers 7 static paper types. All with dark and light variants. Dotted, squared, watercolor papers, etc. We get you covered. Tools: Pen, pencil, marker, lasso for copy and cut, ruler, pixel eraser and vector eraser. All powered by the best Apple Pencil technology. Shortcuts: Want quick access to your favorite tools without adjusting the setting repeatedly? We offer you three quick-access slots per note. Add any tools to it and it saves for you. Intuitiveness: Tap the title name your note, long press to reorder, two-finger tap to undo, two-finger pinch to zoom. It’s that easy! Dark mode: The color scheme will match the system setting automatically. Or you can use iOS dark/light switch to set it to your preferences. Have fun writing! ----------------- “You’ve got the brownie when night is coming, huh~ It's not a dessert". Licensed from artist Yuanyu Zhou(Ins: @frost.tree), Bookbook iMessage app integrates with her "Brownie" series of emoji packs. Term of service: https://www.legolas.me/paperworks/blankbook-terms-of-service Privacy Policy: https://www.legolas.me/paperworks/blankbook-privacy-policy Developer: Yuxiao Wang Special thanks: @Yuanyu Zhou, @Minja. For ideas, testing and feedbacks.
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is rating: Microsoft OneNote at 4.7 against Blankbook's 3.9. Microsoft OneNote also leads on ratings volume (1.1M vs 129) and chart position (#68 vs unranked). Blankbook's advantage is review sentiment (55% vs 45%) and iOS requirement (13.0 vs 18.0). 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
Both are free to download. Microsoft OneNote sells 3 in-app purchases, starting at $9.99 per month and Blankbook sells 2 in-app purchases, starting at $2.49 per month. Whichever you choose, the download price is not the number that matters.
Microsoft OneNote holds the better App Store score, 4.7 against 3.9. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: Microsoft OneNote has 1.1M ratings behind it against 129, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews complicate that: 45% of Microsoft OneNote's written reviews are positive against 55% of Blankbook's, so the app with the better star average is not the one people write more warmly about.
Microsoft OneNote ships an update weekly, Blankbook every 4 days. The most recent releases landed on September 25, 2026 and July 26, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | Microsoft OneNote | Blankbook |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free |
| Rating | 4.7 (1.1M ratings) — better | 3.9 (129 ratings) |
| Positive reviews | 44.8% of reviews | 54.8% of reviews — better |
| Number of ratings | 1.1M — better | 129 |
| Update frequency | Weekly | Every 4 days — better |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | Yes | Yes |
| Monetization | Free with in-app purchases | Free with in-app purchases |
| Best chart rank | #68 — better | — |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad, Apple Watch, Vision Pro | iPhone, iPad, iPod, Mac |
| Requires iOS | 18.0 | 13.0 — better |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 404 MB | 41 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | Microsoft Corporation | 璐 徐 |
Customer experience
Microsoft OneNote
Blankbook
User reviews
Microsoft OneNote
From 1.1M App Store ratingsWhat we love
- 🚀 Simple, works well
- 👍 Great for planning
- 👍 Powerful note-taking app
- 👍 Invaluable tool for note taking
- 👍 Used for years, couldn't be without this app
Room to improve
- 🔨 Could be better
- 🔨 Formatting issues on mobile app
- 🔨 Buggy widget, no dark app icon
- 🐛 Glitchy, crashes often
- 🐛 Terrible sync speeds
Blankbook
From 129 App Store ratingsWhat we love
- ✍️ Natural handwriting and pen feel
- ♾️ Infinite canvas for unlimited space
- 🎨 Simple and clean interface
- ⚡ Good performance and responsiveness
- 💰 One-time purchase option available
Room to improve
- 🐛 Frequent crashes and app failures
- 💾 Data loss and note disappearance
- ⏱️ Severe lag with large amounts of data
- 🔄 Notes not syncing across devices
- 🗂️ No folder or organizational system
Bugs and requests
Microsoft OneNote
Reported bugs
9 issues- Cursor positioning is erratic
- Search function does not work well
- Ink to text conversion missing on iPad
- Syncing issues, notes not syncing properly across devices
- Crashing, freezing, and performance issues
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- Scrolling issues, page jumping to top unexpectedly
- Eraser tool deletes more than intended
- Formatting issues when importing/exporting
- Inconsistent behavior between desktop and mobile versions
Requested features
11 requests- Native Markdown support and merged cell support
- Ruler, ability to choose or create notebook covers
- Ability to password protect app or individual notebooks
- Option to open on last opened page instead of Home
- Ability to turn note into task that appears on To Do and Planner
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- Search for tags, more Evernote-like search features
- Ability to select text using 3D Touch
- Option to limit page to A4 size with framing
- Pencil feature like Notes app for drawing
- Ability to delete notebooks
- Ability to delete notes from Apple devices
Blankbook
Reported bugs
16 issues- App crashes when creating new sheets or files
- Notes permanently disappear without warning
- Severe lag and slow loading with accumulated data
- Delete function doesn't permanently remove notes
- Unresponsive settings and help buttons
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- App fails to open or closes immediately
- Palm rejection issues causing accidental zooms
- Eraser and pencil tool flashing/switching randomly
- Grid/lines don't move with canvas when scrolling or zooming
- Random dots appearing while writing
- Zoom gestures misinterpreted
- Crashes after leaving app in background
- Premium purchase not recognized after reinstall
- Incompatibility with Mac version for editing
- Settings not persisting across sessions
- Performance issues on iPad Pro with iOS 14+
Requested features
20 requests- Folder organization system for notes
- Cloud backup and sync across devices
- Image and PDF insertion capability
- Snap-to-grid and smart shapes
- Ability to rotate and scale selected content
Show 15 moreShow fewer
- Dark mode toggle within app
- Customizable color swatches
- Copy and paste image functionality
- Multi-window support
- Undo/redo button in addition to gesture
- Export as vector file option
- Snap shapes and lines feature
- Lock/pin canvas to grid lines
- Duplicate entire notes function
- Typed text insertion
- More than three tool shortcuts
- Default tool customization
- Larger color palette
- Device synchronization for iPad and iPhone
- Backup system for data protection
In-app purchases
Microsoft OneNote
- Microsoft 365 Personal1 Month trial$9.991 Month
- Microsoft 365 Personal$11.991 Month
- Microsoft 365 Family$12.991 Month
Blankbook
- Monthly7 Days trial$2.491 Month
- Lifetime$6.99
Questions
Is Microsoft OneNote free?
Is Blankbook free?
Which has better reviews, Microsoft OneNote or Blankbook?
Do Microsoft OneNote or Blankbook have ads?
Which is updated more often, Microsoft OneNote or Blankbook?
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