When comparing Apple Notes vs Joplin, the Slant community recommends Joplin for most people. In the question“What is the best cross-platform note-taking app?” Joplin is ranked 2nd while Apple Notes is ranked 18th.
Specs
Ranked in these QuestionsQuestion Ranking
Pros
Pro Sync with other Apple devices via iCloud, other cloud/email services
It syncs with iCloud, and surprisingly, also with Gmail and possibly other services too.
Pro Built-in
It's a default system app, making it easy to find and use since it is already installed.
Pro Rich-text editing
Allows for simple text formatting and making TODO lists with checkboxes.
Pro Attachments
You can add files to notes and then filter notes by attachment types.
Pro Supports sharing
Pro It's fast, and syncing is very dependable
The app launches quickly on both Mac and iOS, it also syncs quickly (in seconds) and very dependably across different Apple devices.
Pro It remains simple to use with a gentle learning curve
Despite the significant new updates in iOS 9 and iOS 10, you can start using Notes immediately, then try/master new features with ease — definitely a gentle learning curve.
Pro Offline access
Pro Open source
Peace of mind that there is no malicious piece of software in the app.
Pro Encryption
Pro Cross-platform
Supports Windows, Mac, Linux, Android and iOS.
Pro Supports file attachments
Pro Supports markdown
Pro Supports tags for notes
Pro Web Clipper
Browser extension saves full pages, clean content, or screen selections to new notes.
Pro Optional CLI interface
Provides a CLI interface for terminal lovers.
Pro Supports multiple languages
English, French, and Spanish, Italian, German, Czech and many others.
Pro Active user forum with support from app creators
Support, troubleshooting, and new feature requests are easy to make at the user forum and you can contact the app creator directly.
Pro Dropbox support
Can sync using Dropbox.
Pro Nextcloud support
Pro Timed alarm reminder for to-do lists
Cons
Con Cannot export to a format that can be imported again
This makes it obscure and cumbersome to back up your notes as files that could be managed by your backup system. You can export to PDF, but not in bulk; and this isn't the native format that you can easily recover with.
Apple compounds the problem by using some undocumented format for notes. You can, however, back them all up by backing up the files found in ~/Library/Containers/com.apple.Notes/Data/Library/Notes
Con Sync issues with Android
If update on Linux then sync on Android, sometimes the Android sync will duplicate or remove some journal notes. Seems to be a bug in the Android app. The Linux app alone without sync with Android seems to work well using Dropbox. But don't expect changes you make on Android to sync properly back to Linux.
Con Sync issue under Linux
The Linux client has a bug that requires the user to click the mouse frequently in order for sync to proceed. This bug has been open for a while.
Con Gargantuan memory footprint
1GB+ of memory for taking notes.
Con Old school interface
Con Bloated
This project is suffering from feature creep and uses a lot of memory for a note-taking app.
Con App Image launches very slowly
On Linux, you can only install via App Image, which take 5+ seconds to launch. I can launch LibreOffice in under two seconds.
Con Sync issues on Windows
No way to change account settings and sync easily corrupted.
Con Weak tag searching
Joplin can currently only search for a single tag at a time. None of the boolean operators (AND, OR, NOT) are available for use in searches. This greatly diminishes the usefulness of tags in Joplin.