Evernote

Overview

Evernote was founded in 2007 by Russian entrepreneur Stepan Pachikov, with Phil Libin serving as an early CEO who led the company through its period of rapid growth. The service launched its first public web version on June 24, 2008, and quickly became known for letting users capture notes, images, and web pages into a single searchable archive that synced across computers and mobile devices.

In November 2022, Evernote was acquired by Bending Spoons, an Italian technology company known for acquiring and operating established consumer apps. Following the acquisition, Evernote moved parts of its operations to Bending Spoons’ infrastructure and reduced the capabilities of its free tier: the Free plan is now limited to 50 notes and a single notebook, with synchronization restricted to one device, whereas earlier versions of the free tier permitted syncing across multiple devices with a monthly upload allowance. Paid tiers were also restructured, with current plans named Free, Starter, Advanced, and Enterprise, replacing the older Free/Personal/Professional naming.

Key Features

• Web clipper — Browser extension for saving articles, pages, and screenshots directly into notes
• Notebooks and tags — Hierarchical organization of notes into notebooks, stacks, and tags
• Cross-device sync — Notes synchronize across desktop, web, and mobile clients (device count limited by plan)
• OCR search — Text recognition allows searching for words inside images and scanned PDFs
• Document scanning — Mobile apps can scan paper documents and business cards
• Offline access — Notes can be edited offline and sync once a connection is restored

Use Cases

• Personal note-taking — Capturing ideas, to-do lists, and web research in one place
• Research and archiving — Clipping articles and PDFs with searchable OCR text
• Project organization — Grouping related notes into notebooks and stacks for ongoing work
• Document digitization — Scanning and storing paper documents and receipts via mobile

Who It’s For

Evernote is aimed at individuals and small teams who want a single, searchable repository for notes, clippings, and scanned documents across their devices. It is distributed through Free, Starter, Advanced, and Enterprise subscription tiers, with the free tier limited to 50 notes, one notebook, and single-device sync.