Comparison

Notepad vs Greatnotes5

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

Head to head
About

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.

Highlights
  • 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
Features
Read full description

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.

About

Greatnotes5

Record, transcribe, and organize lectures, meetings, and ideas with AI-powered summaries, instant answers, and quick actions. Export notes as polished PDFs for easy sharing and collaboration.

Highlights
  • Automatic transcription with time-stamps
  • AI-generated summaries and key takeaways
  • Ask AI questions about your notes
  • Quick AI actions: translate, proofread, expand
  • Export notes as PDF
  • Record lectures and meetings
Features
Read full description

Never take notes again. Greatnotes5 records every conversation and automatically creates summaries, word-for-word transcripts, key points and action items in seconds. ● Tap Record Once. Get Notes Automatically • Word-for-word transcripts • AI summaries & minutes • Action items & follow ups • Key takeaways • Time stamped Transcription • Searchable conversations ● Chat With Your Recordings • What decisions were made? • What are my action items? • Summarize this meeting. • What did we discuss about pricing? • What were the lecture highlights? • What questions were asked? Find answers in seconds. ● AI Writing Assistant • Summarize long recordings • Rewrite professionally • Improve grammar • Translate notes • Generate titles • Create concise highlights • Continue writing ● Share Anywhere Export polished notes as PDF and share with coworkers, clients, classmates, teachers, or your team. ● Coming Soon Turn recordings, PDFs, and documents into AI podcasts you can listen to while commuting, walking, studying, or traveling. FAQs What's the best AI note taking app for iPhone? Greatnotes is an AI Note Taking app that records meetings, lectures, interviews, voice memos, and conversations, then creates transcripts, AI summaries, meeting notes, lecture notes, action items, and searchable notes. Can this app record meetings and create notes automatically? Yes. Greatnotes records meetings and lectures, transcribes speech to text, summarizes discussions, creates meeting minutes, and extracts key takeaways automatically. Can this app transcribe audio into text? Yes. Greatnotes converts speech into accurate, time stamped transcripts for meetings, lectures, interviews, study sessions, classes, and voice recordings. Can I use this app for studying? Yes. Record lectures, generate study notes, review key concepts, and prepare for exams faster. Can I chat with my notes? Yes. Ask questions about meetings and recordings to instantly find decisions, action items, summaries, or important details. Does this app create AI summaries? Yes. Greatnotes summarizes recordings, rewrites notes, translates content, improves writing, generates titles, and helps organize information with AI. Is Greatnotes like Goodnotes, Notability, or Coconote? Greatnotes combines AI note taking, voice recording, speech to text transcription, AI summaries, meeting notes, lecture notes, and AI chat in one iPhone app. Privacy Policy: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1_wdVmWyFuw-bcjgMOr1xqLdBZs47o3anwCtNAM9XUBo/edit?usp=sharing Terms of Usage: https://docs.google.com/document/d/14FDMmPF4e01WpDefHlvt_WyrZwotTlCAlnjeBYPYtPw/edit?tab=t.0 Payment will be charged to iTunes Account at confirmation of purchase. Subscriptions automatically renew unless auto-renew is turned off at least 24-hours before the end of the current subscription period. Your account will be charged for renewal within 24-hours prior to the end of the current period, and the cost of the renewal will be identified. You may manage your subscription and auto-renewal may be turned off by going to your Account Settings after the purchase. Any unused portion of the free trial period will be forfeited when the user purchases a subscription to that publication.

Screenshots

Notepad4 screens
Greatnotes54 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is ads: Greatnotes5 at none against Notepad's shown. Greatnotes5 also leads on update cadence (every 3 days vs every 8 days). Notepad's advantage is review sentiment (84% vs 65%) and ratings volume (28K vs 1.4K). On price, in-app purchases, monetization model 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. Notepad sells 7 in-app purchases, starting at $1.99 per month and Greatnotes5 sells 9 in-app purchases, starting at $3.99 per 7 days. Whichever you choose, the download price is not the number that matters.

ReceptionRating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings

Notepad holds the better App Store score, 4.8 against 4.6. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: Notepad has 28K ratings behind it against 1.4K, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews point the same way: 84% of Notepad's written reviews are positive against 65% of Greatnotes5's.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

Notepad ships an update every 8 days, Greatnotes5 every 3 days. The most recent releases landed on September 24, 2026 and September 23, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard5 real differences · 5 level
Notepad versus Greatnotes5: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterNotepadGreatnotes5
PriceFreeFree
Rating4.8 (28K ratings) — better4.6 (1.4K ratings)
Positive reviews84.1% of reviews — better65.5% of reviews
Number of ratings28K — better1.4K
Update frequencyEvery 8 daysEvery 3 days — better
AdsYesNo — better
In-app purchasesYesYes
MonetizationFree with in-app purchasesFree with in-app purchases
DevicesiPhone, iPadiPhone, iPad
Requires iOS18.018.0
Further details — not scored
Size100 MB71 MB
Age rating4+4+
Developer1381802 Ontario Inc.Kanza Ahmad

Customer experience

Notepad

All ratings27,905 ratings
Positive96.7%
Neutral1.8%
Negative1.5%
Written reviews961 reviews
Positive84.1%
Neutral4.5%
Negative11.4%

Greatnotes5

All ratings1,411 ratings
Positive88.4%
Neutral3.8%
Negative7.8%
Written reviews55 reviews
Positive65.5%
Neutral5.5%
Negative29.1%

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

Greatnotes5

Not enough reviews yet to summarise bugs or requests.

In-app purchases

7 purchases

Notepad

Subscriptions4
  • Monthly Premium Membership$1.991 Month
  • Monthly Premium Subscription$2.991 Month
  • Yearly Premium Subscription$14.991 Year
Show 1 more
  • Yearly Premium Subscription$17.991 Year
One-time3
  • Lifetime Premium Membership$19.99
  • Lifetime Premium Membership$29.99
  • Lifetime Premium Membership$39.99
9 purchases

Greatnotes5

Subscriptions7
  • GreatNotes Weekly Premium$3.997 Days
  • GreatNotes 40% Off7 Days trial$4.991 Month
  • Monthly3 Days trial$5.991 Month
Show 4 more
  • Monthly1 Month trial$9.991 Month
  • Yearly7 Days trial$29.991 Year
  • GreatNotes Yearly Offer7 Days trial$39.991 Year
  • GreatNotes Yearly Premium$59.991 Year
One-time2
  • Lifetime$39.99
  • Lifetime$239.99

Questions

Is Notepad free?
Notepad is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Is Greatnotes5 free?
Greatnotes5 is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Which has better reviews, Notepad or Greatnotes5?
Notepad is rated higher. Notepad averages 4.8 out of 5 from 28K ratings, while Greatnotes5 averages 4.6 from 1.4K ratings.
Do Notepad or Greatnotes5 have ads?
Notepad shows ads; Greatnotes5 does not.
Which is updated more often, Notepad or Greatnotes5?
Notepad ships an update every 8 days, and Greatnotes5 every 3 days. Most recently, Notepad was updated on September 24, 2026 and Greatnotes5 on September 23, 2026.

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