Comparison

Notepad vs Nimbus Note

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

Nimbus Note

This app helps you gather and organize all your information in one place. Create text notes, scan documents, and manage to-do lists. Synchronize your data across devices for easy access and editing.

Highlights
  • Create formatted text notes
  • Attach various file types
  • Scan and digitize documents with OCR
  • Organize with workspaces, folders, and tags
  • Collaborate on notes with others
  • Create to-do lists with reminders
  • Cross-device synchronization
Read full description

Powerful notes app and organizer that helps you gather and organize your information — all in one place. There’s no need to spend time searching for your notes anymore. Create text notes, scan documents and make to-do lists. Synchronize it all with Nimbus Note for future viewing and editing on other devices. Conveniently manage your notes - Create notes in the editor with formatting support — bold, strike, underline, etc. - Add pictures, audio, video, documents, and other types of files. - Scan and digitise any paper documents and pictures using the camera device. The text recognition feature will let you work with scanned files as well as regular notes. Organize your notes - Workspaces - separate personal information from the work-related kind. Create separate databases of notes (with own folders and tags) for different purposes within a single account; - Create folders and subfolders; - Add context to notes using tags; - Use special color labels to make most relevant notes and folders stand out from the list; - Add most important notes to Favorites; Group collaboration on notes - Invite other people to collaborate on notes; - Assign editing rights to each participant (admin, can edit, or reading only); Get complete control over your workflow and daily errands - Add to-do lists to your notes; - Set time reminders for your tasks; Your notes available anywhere, anytime - All of your notes are available on any of your devices — anytime, anywhere; - Create a note on your iPhone, add to that note on your Mac, and finish it later in a browser; - Offline access to your notes. Document scanner in your phone - Scan documents, pictures, handwritten notes; - Auto-define document borders; - Special filters allow making the document black and white or enhance the colors; Security - Nimbus Note is optionally protected with an additional passcode; Powerful search - Nimbus Note can search through not only text but also images; - Search for text in docs/xls/html/ppt and pdf files; - The unique search snippets will let you see the required text fragment without opening the note itself; - You can find entire words as well as word fragments (for example, the search will find "conscious" in "consciousness"); Continued use of GPS running in the background can dramatically decrease battery life. Also Available Nimbus Pro: - 1 GB of new uploads each month; - Large attached files; - Premium support; - More information in every note; - Searching for text in images; - More workspaces; - Advanced encryption; - OCR - getting text from images; - Search in images and documents; $3.99 monthly, $39.99 annually Price may vary by location. Subscriptions will be charged to your credit card through your iTunes account. Your subscription will automatically renew unless canceled at least 24 hours before the end of the current period. You will not be able to cancel the subscription once activated. Manage your subscriptions in Account Settings after purchase. Privacy Policy - https://nimbus.everhelper.me/privacy.php Terms and Conditions - https://nimbus.everhelper.me/terms-and-conditions.php

Screenshots

Notepad4 screens
Nimbus Note4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is ads: Nimbus Note at none against Notepad's shown. Nimbus Note also leads on iOS requirement (14.0 vs 18.0). Notepad's advantage is ratings volume (28K vs 400) and rating (4.8 vs 4.5). On price, update cadence, in-app purchases and monetization model 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 Nimbus Note sells 2 in-app purchases, starting at $7.99 per month. 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 4.5. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: Notepad has 28K ratings behind it against 400, 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 75% of Nimbus Note's.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

Notepad ships an update every 8 days, Nimbus Note fortnightly. Both last shipped on September 25, 2026.

Scorecard5 real differences · 5 level
Notepad versus Nimbus Note: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterNotepadNimbus Note
PriceFreeFree
Rating4.8 (28K ratings) — better4.5 (400 ratings)
Positive reviews84.1% of reviews — better75.1% of reviews
Number of ratings28K — better400
Update frequencyEvery 8 days — betterFortnightly
AdsYesNo — better
In-app purchasesYesYes
MonetizationFree with in-app purchasesFreemium
DevicesiPhone, iPadiPhone, iPad, iPod — better
Requires iOS18.014.0 — better
Further details — not scored
Size100 MB85 MB
Age rating4+4+
Developer1381802 Ontario Inc.Nimbus Web Inc

Customer experience

Notepad

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

Nimbus Note

All ratings400 ratings
Positive88.3%
Neutral3.0%
Negative8.8%
Written reviews429 reviews
Positive75.1%
Neutral4.7%
Negative20.3%

User reviews

Notepad

From 28K App Store ratings

What we love

  • 👍 Simple and easy to use
  • 📝 Useful for notes, lists, and reminders
  • 🎨 Customizable font and color options
  • 💾 Reliable for storing important information
  • 🔍 Helpful search functionality

Room to improve

  • 💰 Premium subscription required to remove ads
  • 🐛 Occasional data loss or note disappearance
  • 📤 Lack of sharing or exporting options
  • 🔒 No password protection for individual notes

Nimbus Note

From 400 App Store ratings

What we love

  • 🚀 Great for notes and screenshots
  • 🚀 Better than Evernote
  • 👍 Better folder structure and AI search
  • 👍 Reliable and constantly improving
  • 👍 Useful, beautiful and free

Room to improve

  • 🐛 Misleading, just a version of Notes app
  • 🐛 Lacks feature parity with web and desktop
  • 🐛 Unreliable, lost notes and pictures
  • 🐛 Slow and unreliable
  • 🐛 Crashes on opening on iPad

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

Nimbus Note

Reported bugs

5 issues
  • Sync issues, different device counts
  • Notes disappearing or getting corrupted
  • Crashes when editing notes
  • Incompatible with older devices
  • Crashes on opening the app

Requested features

10 requests
  • Ability to scribble/write using pen
  • Offline access
  • Fujitsu scanner integration
  • Ability to change default font colors
  • Search in current folder
Show 5 more
  • Search folders instead of notes
  • Sort option per folder
  • Pin note
  • Search preset or smart folders
  • Centralized note with block alias from other notes

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
2 purchases

Nimbus Note

Subscriptions2
  • Nimbus Pro$7.991 Month
  • Nimbus Pro$71.991 Year

Questions

Is Notepad free?
Notepad is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Is Nimbus Note free?
Nimbus Note is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Which has better reviews, Notepad or Nimbus Note?
Notepad is rated higher. Notepad averages 4.8 out of 5 from 28K ratings, while Nimbus Note averages 4.5 from 400 ratings.
Do Notepad or Nimbus Note have ads?
Notepad shows ads; Nimbus Note does not.
Which is updated more often, Notepad or Nimbus Note?
Notepad ships an update every 8 days, and Nimbus Note fortnightly. Most recently, Notepad was updated on September 25, 2026 and Nimbus Note on September 25, 2026.

Other comparisons