Best Filing Cabinet Ever! Evernote

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[toolfinderhq]

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[emmgeevideo]

First of all, the idea that people use Evernote because somehow they have to because they have so much stuff in there is baloney. If Notion magically had global search, a robust web clipper, etc. (your four points), people would switch gladly because they like Notion’s other excellent features, most of which stodgy Evernote lacks. People don’t use Dropbox or Google Drive the way you can use Evernote because neither of those tools has Evernote’s global search, web clipper, etc. (your four points).

There is no “killer app” for personal organization. I have lately been storing PDFs in my iPad Pro in Good Notes 5, in large part because it’s so much easier for me to read a PDF on my iPad (physical form factor) and I can annotate as I read, something I regularly do on paper “PDFs”. It would be great if Evernote had that feature but it doesn’t. So I won’t use it for that. I’ll use Good Notes 5 and also take advantage of GN5’s excellent handwriting tools in conjunction with the iPad Pro’s excellent pencil. Throw in PaperLike to simulate paper and you have an excellent productivity and storage tool that other apps/hardware can’t match.

I use Microsoft OneDrive for my PC backup and file storage because it integrates so nicely (better than Dropbox and Google Drive IMHO) with the device that I constantly use (my laptop) for spreadsheets, presentations, etc. In that sense, it is an infinitely better “file cabinet” than Evernote. I would never consider saving Word, Excel, and PowerPoint files in Evernote. It’s not a good file cabinet for those documents. I also use OneDrive for my family photos and my photo hobby (30, 000 photos) because I like the simple file folder organization and the viewer is awesome and works well on PC, Mac, iOS, and Android. And I trust that Microsoft won’t go out of business.

In another part of my life I am a DIY home improvement buff. I have a nice workshop with some really great tools. One of my favorite sayings is “the right tool for the job” because it gives me an excuse to go out and buy that cool Dremel tool that I don’t really need but I really want to have. I view productivity tools the same way. Many of us have a “workshop” of productivity tools that we regularly return to because they are “the right tool for the job”. We go out and get a tool like Notion because it’s like that cool Dremel saw that has a really fun niche purpose but we go back to the same core set of tools for most things because they are robust, reliable, and easy to use.

Your recent mea culpa video and the Steve Dotto guest spot inspired me to give another think to Evernote. I took Steve’s course and bought Stacey Harmon’s $20 Evernote configuration guide (excellent — highly recommended). I’ll be very interested in what you produce as well. It’s really added a lot of life to Evernote for me.

Saying Evernote is “the best filing cabinet ever” is faint praise and still retains a sort of embarrassed sentiment, kind of like admitting you still go to bed with your teddy bear at night. “Well Evernote actually isn’t cool and I know I look like a grandpa because I use it, but golly it sure is a great filing cabinet!” (exaggerating of course). I think what we’re finding is that we’re returning to Evernote because it’s actually pretty good and it fills a major need that Notion, Todoist, Asana, Google Drive, Coda, etc., can’t match. Those of us who are looking for the “killer app” look at it and shake our head because it doesn’t do this or that. I think the better metaphor is “workshop” and a willingness to accommodate a variety of tools that are “the right tool for the job”. Evernote clearly can be one of those tools for many of us. And when we open our minds, we can use the old standbys in new “exciting” ways.

It wouldn’t hurt if Ian and team would get off their arses and update the darn thing...

[meathead]

I migrated from Evernote to Onenote last year and am not looking back. Best decision ever.

[Jayromee]

Evernote is good. I totally rely on it for all my notes and documents. I do lots of notes everyday and scan lots of documents. I have gone completely paperless. Thanks to Evernote.

[mzainpk]

I used Evernote for years, but then I switched to Onenote and it is a winner all the way. Use Onenote once you will be addicted.

[GeorgeLara]

I really wanted to like Notion, but I felt that it was trying to do too many things. It's part Evernote, AirTable, ToDoist, etc.. and I just found it a bit confusing at times.

[wherezthebeef]

I stay with Evernote for one killer feature: Their web clipper is just the best. It's so good, this single feature has changed my workflow in many ways. I can't live without it.. druthers: nested folders. Come on, big E, I've been waiting more than a decade, paying$$ customer. I'm also so familiar with Evernote I can make it fly and know all (most..) of the keyboard shortcuts.. and I'm just burned out learning new software.

[donners]

I love Evernote, but really need some high end tips to make the most of it

[akbc]

Once my subscription ends in 2 months I'm not renewing it for the first time since 2013. I went from using evernote for pretty much everything to just cluttering stuff there. So I've been cleaning my files (mostly from college) saving them as pdf's in an archives folder in dropbox. I'll probably keep the free version for the web clipper and camera which I use a lot for research but honestly, if Microsoft had added more features to the Apple versions of OneNote, I would've switched long ago. I tried Notion but its not for me. I now use apple notes for quick notes and Bear for all of my writing bc their tag system and markdown works perfectly for my workflow, then I just do final processing and editing in word or pages

[carprincess]

Thanks for the video! I never have been an Evernote user, but I'm glad to hear that it's still doing well!

[Prof.SchulzeSternberg]

Is there a way to save a pdf in Evernote as a document rather than as a file? In OneNote you would „print“ the pdf as far as i can remember.

edit: I just checked in my old Evernote account, that looks different, have they changed that? You don’t just see the pdf symbol but also the content of the pdf...

[hartmutschroder]

I'm also a big fan of Evernote. For me one of the biggest points is missing. The tags are much better to organize the notes (docs) than the Notebooks, because it's possible to use more than one on one note. That gives me a big flexibility which is difficult to get with, for example, drive. But thank you for the Video.

[whatsupdate]

I’d be interested in a video comparing Notion, Airtable, and Coda

[ronaldfabricante]

Are you able to password protect these documents that you scan into Evernote?

[CameronNorfleet]

Google Drive is the best filing cabinet ever... Evernote is the best digital junk drawer ever. I use Evernote to hold onto random notes, clippings & documents that I want to hold onto just in case I ever need them. I go in there every few months to clean out the junk that I realize that I'm never going to use.

[MostafaAhmedAhmed]

You’ve mentioned 4 killer features that makes EN the best note-taking platform, they are the main reason I’m sticking to it despite of its high price. They are somehow behind the competition, but they still have the chance to catch up having these powerful capabilities.

Notion has very powerful organization features, but it cannot stand alone. I’m planning to use Notion to manage my project materials, but missing custom links makes linking my it with Evernote not possible, and I like to link thinks together. So I stick to Evernote for note-taking, GTD workflow, project materials, digital archive, learning and research (hey clipper!), and more. Im still trying to find a way to benefit from capabilities of Notion. It’s promising, but still need a lot of work, and this a good chance for Evernote to catch up.

[jimgrant]

Hey, Francesco. - - - One of my favorite features of Evernote is the view controller (it doesn't have an official name). With it, a user can control whether the Note Preview shows, whether the Note List is on the side or top, the sort order of the notes in the Notes List, and which columns are shown in the Note List.

And the best part, Evernote will remember the structure of the view a user sets up for a specific Notebook or Saved Search with the "Always Use For" menu option.

I've watched a lot of YouTube videos on Evernote, but I don't remember this feature being discussed. I think it is worthy of a video by itself. Please consider making one.

Thanks.

[starshipduck]

I use it as solely an archive however if you use it as an archive primarily it’s a very expensive one at that. I don’t want to pay $75 a year for something I only send articles to and send files to. I rather use my private cloud service for this or even a public cloud service like google drive etc.

[pjpw]

Francesco, you really owe it to yourself and your viewers to check out and report on the latest version of Nimbus Note. It has many enhancements and to my mind is a better option than Evernote. The new editor is very much like Notion in that it uses blocks.

[justindirose]

Audio is pretty spot on in this video, Francesco. New mic or setup?