Notepad vs Make List
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
Notepad
Capture thoughts, create to-do lists, and organize ideas with a versatile digital notebook. Supports handwriting, text notes, and secure cloud syncing. Personalize your experience with custom themes and icons.
- Create to-do lists with checkboxes
- Unlimited text notes
- Handwritten notes with Apple Pencil
- Organize notes into folders
- Pin and sort notes
- iCloud backup and sync
- Advanced search functionality
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Jot down notes and organize your ideas with Notepad—the classic notepad writing app designed for keeping track of everything that matters. [ TO-DO LISTS ] • Create beautiful task lists with interactive checkboxes to track your daily tasks and goals. • Drag and drop to reorder items—organize your to-dos exactly how you want them. • Enjoy the satisfying experience of checking off completed tasks as you get things done. • Perfect for shopping lists, daily chores, project tasks, and everything in between. [ NOTES ] • Create unlimited text notes with rich formatting—quickly and easily. • Tap anywhere to start typing—it's simple, fast, and always saved automatically. • Works perfectly in both light and dark mode. [ RICH TEXT FORMATTING ] • Style your notes with bold, italic, underline, and strikethrough. • Choose from 7 text colors and 7 highlight colors to make important details stand out. • Pick from 18 handpicked font families—each with proper bold and italic variants. • A convenient formatting toolbar sits right above the keyboard for fast access. • Switch fonts anytime—your existing formatting is preserved. [ HANDWRITTEN NOTES WITH APPLE PENCIL ] • Capture your thoughts naturally with fluid, responsive handwriting that feels like pen on paper. • Create beautiful handwritten notes, diagrams, and drawings with realistic ink flow and pressure sensitivity. • Choose from fountain pens, pencils, and highlighters with customizable colors for a personalized writing experience. • Enjoy our adaptive paper grid that works perfectly in any orientation or device. [ FOLDERS - ORGANIZE YOUR NOTES ] • Organize notes into folders and subfolders with a clean, nested structure. • Assign a unique color to each folder, making it simple to categorize and find notes at a glance. • Drag-and-drop to reorder, and move multiple notes easily. [ PIN & SORT NOTES ] • Pin important notes to the top and sort by date, custom order, or alphabetical order. [ BACKUP WITH ICLOUD ] • Keep notes safe with automatic backups and iCloud sync across your devices. [ PERSONALIZE YOUR NOTEPAD ] • Give your notepad a personal touch with unique app icons, custom colors, stylish fonts, and a sleek dark mode for night owls. [ FIND NOTES FAST ] • Use advanced search tools and text highlighting to track down exactly what you're looking for. [ KEEP YOUR NOTES SAFE ] • Lock your notes with FaceID or TouchID for extra privacy. [ SHARE & PRINT ] • Send your notes to other apps like Mail or WhatsApp, or print them directly from Notepad. [ PREMIUM FEATURES FOR POWER USERS ] • Go ad-free, unlock exclusive themes, and get advanced sorting options with Premium. Notepad combines the nostalgic feel of a simple notebook with the functionality of today's tech. Use Notepad for everything from brainstorming ideas and setting personal reminders to creating shopping lists, to-do lists, grocery lists, chores lists, appointment notes, class notes, daily goals, password hints, birthday reminders, packing lists, travel itineraries, and more. Write, organize, and stay on top of everything that matters—download Notepad now and stay productive your way! Terms of Use & Privacy Policy: https://www.oldnotepad.com/terms.
Make List
Organize daily tasks, shopping lists, or any to-do with this fast checklist app. Create nested folders for deep organization and easily back up or share lists via text. A green line indicator confirms when all items are checked.
- Nested folder organization
- Uncheck All function
- Delete Selected items
- Offline backup via copy/paste
- Move items between folders
- Green line completion indicator
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Make List App is a great tool ranging from organizing every day 'take to work' list, using the 'Uncheck All' to clear the list for another use, to food shopping or todo list, and finally using the 'Delete Selected' to delete checked items. Since every item in every list in Make List App can be a folder, Make List let's you organize your lists without limiting the number of folders and subfolders you can use. The 'Options' menu can be customize to hide/show some of the options in the Settings screen. Other power features include: • Simple offline backup via copy paste. - Using the 'Copy Selected to Pasteboard' from the Options menu, you can copy all selected items of a list to the device's pasteboard. You can paste it anywhere from an email to any other text App on the device. The Paste List from pasteboard completes the cycle by letting you import from the device's pasteboard. This means you can either backup or share by any text app (such as Messages or Mail). • Move items between folders - Similar to 'Copy/Paste from pasteboard' but done internally without the device's pasteboard. Simple function to move items between folders. • Green line indicator when all items are checked. - Very handy on longer lists. You can make sure all items are selected without inspecting them all visually. When the last selectable items is selected, a green line will light up, indicating that all items are selected.
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is rating: Notepad at 4.8 against Make List's 3.0. Notepad also leads on ratings volume (29K vs 1) and update cadence (every 8 days vs every 5 weeks). Make List's advantage is in-app purchases (none vs 7) and ads (none vs shown). On price 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. Notepad sells 7 in-app purchases, starting at $1.99 per month. Make List asks for nothing beyond the download.
Notepad holds the better App Store score, 4.8 against 3.0. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: Notepad has 29K ratings behind it against 1, so its average is the more settled of the two.
Notepad ships an update every 8 days, Make List every 5 weeks. The most recent releases landed on October 26, 2026 and October 6, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | Notepad | Make List |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free |
| Rating | 4.8 (29K ratings) — better | 3.0 (1 ratings) |
| Positive reviews | 84.3% of reviews | — |
| Number of ratings | 29K — better | 1 |
| Update frequency | Every 8 days — better | Every 5 weeks |
| Ads | Yes | No — better |
| In-app purchases | Yes | No — better |
| Monetization | Free with in-app purchases | Free — better |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad | iPhone, iPad, iPod — better |
| Requires iOS | 18.0 | 16.6 — better |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 75 MB | 2 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | 1381802 Ontario Inc. | Rod Bauer |
Customer experience
Notepad
Make List
Bugs and requests
Notepad
Reported bugs
2 issues- Notes randomly disappearing
- Ads covering up the note-taking area
Requested features
4 requests- Add drawing/highlighting tools
- Integrate with calendar and contacts
- Ability to sort and organize notes
- Option to password protect specific notes
Make List
Not enough reviews yet to summarise bugs or requests.
In-app purchases
Notepad
- Monthly Premium Membership$1.991 Month
- Monthly Premium Subscription$2.991 Month
- Yearly Premium Subscription$14.991 Year
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- Yearly Premium Subscription$19.991 Year
- Lifetime Premium Membership$19.99
- Lifetime Premium Membership$29.99
- Lifetime Premium Membership$49.99
Make List
No in-app purchases









