Prism Notes vs HarkNote
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
Prism Notes
Capture thoughts and links quickly with a familiar texting interface. Organize ideas with AI-suggested tags and develop them across linked threads. Review notes to keep what matters and easily search by keyword or meaning.
- Texting-like note capture
- AI-suggested tags
- Threaded idea development
- Review mode for notes
- Sync across devices
- Natural language reminders
- Lock screen capture
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Prism is the private place for quick thoughts and links. It feels like texting, rather than writing in a document. Capture easily, organize with tags, develop ideas across threads, review to keep only what matters. Free to try! Features: - Private and on-device - Opt in to iCloud sync between iPhone and Mac - Voice transcription and voice memos - Lock screen widgets for text and voice capture - AI-suggested tags to make organizing easy or automatic AI tagging (requires apple intelligence) - Review mode to keep notes alive or let them go - Threads to evolve a thought and link them together - Search by keyword - Natural language reminders - just say "remind me tomorrow at 2pm" (requires apple intelligence)
HarkNote
Record, transcribe, and summarize audio privately on your device. Features include speaker labeling, on-device AI for summaries and Q&A, and Apple Watch integration. Your data remains on your iPhone unless you choose to share it.
- On-device audio recording
- Offline transcription
- Speaker labeling
- AI-powered summaries and Q&A
- Apple Watch companion app
- Calendar integration
- Private data storage
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HarkNote is a private voice recorder and meeting transcription app. Recording, transcription, speaker labels and summaries all run on your iPhone. There is no account, no sign-in, no analytics and no cloud. Your audio and your notes never leave the device unless you share them yourself. WHAT IT DOES • Record meetings, interviews, lectures and voice notes, or import audio from the share sheet • Transcribe offline with NVIDIA Parakeet or Whisper, running on your iPhone • Speaker labels tell who said what, and finish even for two and three hour meetings • Summaries, key points, action items and decisions with Apple Intelligence on supported iPhones, with an honest fallback when it is not available • Ask questions about a recording and get answers from the transcript, on device • Transcribe a finished recording again with a different model whenever the audio is still on your iPhone • Apple Watch companion: record on your wrist and hand the audio to your iPhone, with an optional live preview while you speak • Calendar-aware: see today's meetings and start a recording from the list • Control Center and Live Activity controls so a recording is one tap away PRIVATE BY DEFAULT • No account, no telemetry, nothing phones home • Your recordings stay in your own iCloud Drive and your notes in your private iCloud database, never on our servers • A save receipt tells you exactly when a note is safely stored, so you can put the phone away BUILT FOR LONG SESSIONS Hour-long meetings are normal. If the app is closed mid-way, processing picks up where it left off instead of starting over, and the card tells you how long it has been running and how long is left. Languages: English, German, Spanish, French, Italian, Dutch and Portuguese. HarkNote is a one-time purchase. No subscription.
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is price: Prism Notes at Free against HarkNote's $4.99. Prism Notes also leads on ratings volume (33 vs 1) and update cadence (every 4 days vs every 10 days). HarkNote's advantage is in-app purchases (none vs 2) and chart position (#151 vs unranked). On rating, review sentiment, 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
Prism Notes is free to download; HarkNote costs $4.99 up front. Prism Notes sells 2 one-off in-app purchases. HarkNote asks for nothing beyond the download.
On the App Store both sit at effectively the same score — 4.9 for Prism Notes against 5.0 for HarkNote. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: Prism Notes has 33 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.
Prism Notes ships an update every 4 days, HarkNote every 10 days. The most recent releases landed on October 17, 2026 and October 8, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | Prism Notes | HarkNote |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free — better | $4.99 |
| Rating | 4.9 (33 ratings) | 5.0 (1 ratings) — better |
| Positive reviews | 100.0% of reviews | 100.0% of reviews |
| Number of ratings | 33 — better | 1 |
| Update frequency | Every 4 days — better | Every 10 days |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | Yes | No — better |
| Monetization | Free — better | Paid |
| Best chart rank | — | #151 — better |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad, Mac, Apple Watch — better | iPhone, iPad, Apple Watch |
| Requires iOS | 18.6 | 17.0 — better |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 19 MB | 27 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | Tommy Joseph | Christopher Knuteson |
Customer experience
Prism Notes
HarkNote
In-app purchases
Prism Notes
- Lifetime Unlock$6.99
- Lifetime Unlock$12.99
HarkNote
No in-app purchases









