Comparison

Lectra Notes vs Anote

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

Head to head
About

Lectra Notes

This app provides a private workspace for reading, annotating, and organizing PDF documents. It helps users understand dense texts faster with on-device intelligence for summaries and suggested tags. Designed for a calmer document workflow, it ensures your files remain private.

Highlights
  • Read and mark up PDFs
  • Highlight key passages and add notes
  • Organize documents with folders and tags
  • Generate summaries and suggested tags
  • Private by design with on-device intelligence
  • Backup and sync library
Features
Read full description

Lectra is a workspace for the documents you think on: lecture slides, problem sets, papers, and textbooks, marked up by hand and kept in one library that works without a signal. READ AND MARK UP Open any PDF and work it over with Apple Pencil. A pressure-responsive pen, highlighter, and eraser in a calm, distraction-free editor keep your ink sharp at any zoom. Select the document's own text with a finger. On Apple Pencil Pro, squeeze to switch tools. MADE FOR IPHONE DUO Folded, Lectra fits the outer screen. Open it, and your page spreads across the full display, with every control kept clear of the camera and status bar. On iPad, keep two documents side by side. RECORD THE LECTURE BESIDE YOUR NOTES Start recording from a control that floats above the whole app, then keep writing. Tap a handwritten stroke to hear what was being said as the pen moved. Drag the playhead and watch the page fill back in, stroke by stroke. Transcription runs on your iPad, and an hour of lecture takes about 15 MB. NOTEBOOKS AND PAPER Start from a blank page when the thinking hasn't found a document yet. Choose blank, lined, grid, dotted, or Cornell paper for each new page, then export your pages as PDFs. SCAN ANYTHING Bring paper into the record. Scan pages with the camera and mark them up like any other PDF. ASK YOUR DOCUMENTS Ask a question about what you're reading and get an answer that cites the page it came from. Summarize a document to get to the point faster. These features run on your iPad, are off until you turn them on, and never use your notes or documents to train a model. WHEN READING TURNS INTO WORK Run Python where you already work: notebooks with charts, a real shell, Git, and a code editor, all on your iPad and all offline. The document and the work on it stay in the same place. YOUR MAC, TOO Lectra for Mac is a free download at canvascope.org/mac. It brings the whole app to your desktop, puts your Mac on your iPad as a remote desktop, sends documents straight between iPad and Mac, and shares one clipboard. The Remote Desktop assistant can open a website, search, or launch an app on your Mac in one step, and asks before it acts unless you turn on Auto-run. A LIBRARY THAT KEEPS UP Everything in one place, available offline, and backed up when you sign in. Your documents are yours: export them anytime, in formats that open anywhere. PRIVATE BY DESIGN No ads and no tracking. Lectra is free to use.

About

Anote

This AI-powered notebook transforms physical documents into structured digital notes. It automatically identifies and categorizes text, images, and equations, making studying and organizing information efficient and engaging.

Highlights
  • AI-powered layout analysis
  • Smart text and image recognition
  • Seamless digitization of physical documents
  • Automatic categorization of scanned elements
  • Gamified productivity features
Features
Read full description

Anote: Turn Any Document Into Mastery Anote is a note-taking and learning app that turns the documents you already have into an interactive study experience. Upload a PDF, let Anote map its layout, and start learning, one focused session at a time. WHY ANOTE? Most note apps just store your files. Anote understands them. It reads the layout of every page, picks out figures, tables and equations, and helps you turn passive reading into active recall. KEY FEATURES - Auto-capture: Anote finds every figure, table and equation on the page and snips it into your notes in one tap. - Active Recall & Review: A built-in spaced-repetition system keeps your most important cards due at the right time, with accuracy tracking and review streaks. - Handwriting Canvas: Annotate, sketch, and take freehand notes on a smooth, natural drawing canvas. - Truly Global: Full support for English, Spanish, Japanese, Korean, Dutch, and Chinese. STUDY THE SMART WAY Whether you're preparing for an exam, working through research papers, or building a lifelong learning habit, Anote turns your documents into a clear path to mastery. Download Anote and make every document count. Terms of Use: https://www.anote.page/terms

Screenshots

Lectra Notes4 screens
Anote4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is ads: Lectra Notes at none against Anote's shown. Lectra Notes also leads on update cadence (weekly vs every 6 months) and monetization model (free vs ad-supported). Anote's advantage is iOS requirement (15.1 vs 18.0). On price, rating, in-app purchases 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

CostPrice · In-app purchases · Ads · Monetization

Both are free to download. Neither carries in-app purchases, so what you see is what you pay.

ReceptionRating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings

On the App Store both sit at effectively the same score — 5.0 for Lectra Notes against 5.0 for Anote. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: Lectra Notes has 9 ratings behind it against 1, so its average is the more settled of the two.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

Lectra Notes ships an update weekly, Anote every 6 months. Both last shipped on November 5, 2026.

Scorecard5 real differences · 4 level
Lectra Notes versus Anote: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterLectra NotesAnote
PriceFreeFree
Rating5.0 (9 ratings)5.0 (1 ratings)
Number of ratings9 — better1
Update frequencyWeekly — betterEvery 6 months
AdsNo — betterYes
In-app purchasesNoNo
MonetizationFree — betterAd-supported
DevicesiPhone, iPadiPhone, iPad, iPod — better
Requires iOS18.015.1 — better
Further details — not scored
Size51 MB76 MB
Age rating4+4+
DeveloperNoel SasonKyuman Kim

Customer experience

Lectra Notes

All ratings9 ratings
Positive100.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative0.0%

Anote

All ratings1 ratings
Positive100.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative0.0%

In-app purchases

None

Lectra Notes

No in-app purchases

None

Anote

No in-app purchases

Questions

Is Lectra Notes free?
Lectra Notes is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Is Anote free?
Anote is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Which has better reviews, Lectra Notes or Anote?
Lectra Notes and Anote are both rated 5.0 out of 5 on the App Store, from 9 and 1 ratings respectively.
Do Lectra Notes or Anote have ads?
Anote shows ads; Lectra Notes does not.
Which is updated more often, Lectra Notes or Anote?
Lectra Notes ships an update weekly, and Anote every 6 months. Most recently, Lectra Notes was updated on November 5, 2026 and Anote on November 5, 2026.

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