What’s Appening: Getting Organized

In today’s edition of What’s Appening, Minnesota Live producer Lauren Andrego discusses notetaking apps for your smart phone and tablet. Here’s what she talked about:

APPLE NOTES

Apple Notes is free and comes pre-installed on all iOS devices.

It has all the basic functions of a notetaking app, and includes plenty of features you’ve probably not discovered on your phone.

It’s very popular for students with iPads, and with iCloud, everything note you make will be accessible on all your Apple devices.

Apple Notes is super compatible with the Apple pencil – you can drive, write and even convert your handwriting into text.

The only big downside: there’s a lack of flexibility with customization.

But if you’re someone who’s only looking for the basics, there’s no need to find another app. This one will work for you.

CRAFT

Craft is free on all iOS devices. It was named Mac’s App of the Year and was a finalist for the Apple Design awards.

Craft is essentially a word processor. This app will do anything Word or Google Docs will do.

Like Apple Notes, you can use this app on your phone, tablet or computer, and the notes will appear on all your devices.

Craft allows for more customization so you can tailor the app to what works for you. I like this app better than Apple Notes for its minimalist layout and user-friendliness.

GOODNOTES 5

Goodnotes 5 costs $7.99 in the app store. This one-time purchase will unlock all features.

I downloaded this app because many iPad users say it’s the first app they got.

The best part about Goodnotes is it does exactly what you want it to do – all the basic notetaking features are here, and it includes an interactive home screen that lets you sort notes into different notebooks and folders.

What I REALLY like about Goodnotes is you can import templates – ones that you make on your own, or they’re easy to find for free or cheap on websites like Pinterest and Etsy.

Here’s why I like this app better than a paper planner: You can keep an unlimited number of notebooks organized and with you at all times. If you don’t like a page, you can delete it. If you’re looking for something you wrote up a year ago, just search for it by keyword. And with the Apple pencil, you’re still “writing things down,” which, personally, helps me remember things.