Raven vs Notedown
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
Raven
Create, organize, and manage notes using Markdown on your Apple devices. Turn checkboxes into actionable tasks with local reminders. Your notes are stored locally, ensuring offline access and no vendor lock-in.
- Native Markdown editor
- Create notes with tables, images, code blocks
- Checkboxes to tasks with due dates
- Local reminders for tasks
- Offline access
- iCloud Drive sync
- Full-text search
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Beautiful notes. Never locked in. Raven is a native Markdown notes app for iPhone, iPad, and Mac. Write, journal, capture articles, and turn checkboxes into reminders—without putting your work in a proprietary note format. WRITE WITH CONTEXT Create notes with tables, images, checklists, code blocks, wiki links, and backlinks. Organize them with folders and tags, pin what matters, and find anything with full-text search. TURN NOTES INTO ACTION A checkbox can become a task with a due date and time. Raven gathers open tasks from across your notes, keeps each one linked to its source, and can send a local reminder when it is due. Complete or snooze it from the notification. JOURNAL WITHOUT ANOTHER SILO Daily and weekly journals live beside the rest of your writing. Save articles to Read Later, or capture a thought from widgets, Shortcuts, and the share sheet. MARKDOWN YOU CAN KEEP Raven works offline without an account. Keep notes on this device, choose a folder on Mac, or use iCloud Drive to keep the same Markdown files available in Files and Finder across iPhone, iPad, and Mac. No proprietary note format. No forced account. One purchase, with no subscription.
Notedown
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Notedown is a featherweight markdown notes app for people who just want to write. No accounts, no sync, no clutter — every note is saved as a plain .md text file on your device and never leaves it. WRITE IN MARKDOWN Use familiar markdown to structure your thoughts: headings, bold and italic, bulleted lists, checkboxes, quotes, code, and links. A one-tap formatting toolbar inserts the syntax for you, so you never have to remember it. EDIT OR PREVIEW Flip between a distraction-free editor and a clean rendered preview with a single tap. See exactly how your note looks, then jump back to writing. FULLY OFFLINE, FULLY YOURS Your notes are stored as standard markdown files in the app's own folder on your device. There is no cloud, no login, and nothing to set up. What you write stays with you. FIND ANYTHING FAST Search across all of your notes instantly. The list keeps your most recently edited notes at the top. SHARE WHEN YOU WANT Export any note as markdown text through the standard share sheet. SIMPLE BY DESIGN - Light and dark themes - English and Japanese - Portrait, one-handed friendly layout - Free to use (contains ads) Notedown is the calm, lightweight alternative to heavy note apps — just markdown, and nothing in your way.
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is price: Notedown at Free against Raven's $19.99. Notedown also leads on iOS requirement (17.0 vs 26.0). Raven's advantage is device support (3 vs 1). On 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
Notedown is free to download; Raven costs $19.99 up front. Neither carries in-app purchases, so what you see is what you pay.
Raven ships an update every 3 days, Notedown every 4 days. Both last shipped on November 5, 2026.
| Parameter | Raven | Notedown |
|---|---|---|
| Price | $19.99 | Free — better |
| Rating | 4.0 (4 ratings) — better | — |
| Positive reviews | 57.1% of reviews | — |
| Number of ratings | 4 — better | — |
| Update frequency | Every 3 days — better | Every 4 days |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | No | No |
| Monetization | Paid | — |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad, Mac — better | iPhone |
| Requires iOS | 26.0 | 17.0 — better |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 126 MB | 24 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | Thomas Sivilay | Yuki Okawa |
In-app purchases
Raven
No in-app purchases
Notedown
No in-app purchases









