⚡ Quick Verdict:
- Pricing: Notejoy runs Free, Solo: $4, Plus: $8, Premium: $12. Microsoft OneNote is listed as Contact for the exact pricing.
- Best for: Notejoy for shared team libraries. OneNote for personal note taking across multiple devices.
- Key difference: Notejoy is a lightweight, team-first note taking app. OneNote is a free-form canvas tied to Microsoft 365.
- Our pick: Microsoft OneNote for most people, because the app itself costs nothing with a Microsoft account.
Small teams shop for a note taking app for one reason.
They want shared notes that anyone can actually find later.
Notejoy pitches itself as fast and focused notes for teams.
Microsoft OneNote pitches itself as a free digital notebook for everyone.
Both let you create notes, drop in images, and share a link.
But they were built for very different jobs.
Overview
This Notejoy vs Microsoft OneNote comparison covers pricing, features, and ease of use.
We also look at who each tool suits best.
Our sources include published specs, product documentation, and G2 reviews.
Our writers also spent hands-on time with both apps.
Those observations appear in the What Our Team Noticed sections below.
What is Notejoy?
Notejoy is a note taking app built for teams and small groups.
It acts as a shared workspace for a project, a department, or a whole company.
Any note added to a team library is shared with every member automatically.
The tool stays lightweight on purpose, which helps page speed.
You capture ideas, share files, and organize everything in one searchable place.
Here is a closer look at how the app works day to day.
Notejoy
Fast and focused notes for teams. Shared libraries, real time editing, and search that reads text inside images.
Notejoy Pricing
Here is what Notejoy costs in 2026. Prices are per user.
| Plan | Price | Best For |
|---|---|---|
| Free | Free | Trying the app with a small personal library |
| Solo | $4 | One person who needs more storage |
| Plus | $8 | Small teams sharing notes daily |
| Premium | $12 | Teams that want premium features and offline access |
Pricing verified July 2026.
Free trial: Yes. The free plan works with no card and no time limit.
Money-back guarantee: Not published. Ask support before you buy an annual plan.
📌 Note: The free plan caps you at 100MB of storage. Offline access and end-to-end encryption sit behind the paid tiers.
⚠️ Pricing conflict: Our research notes a $48 per year figure for a Notejoy premium tier. Our database lists Free, Solo: $4, Plus: $8, and Premium: $12. We use the database figures above. Check the pricing page before you pay.
Key Benefits of Notejoy
Here is what makes Notejoy worth a look:
- Team libraries: Create a library, invite people, and set each person’s privileges. New notes reach the whole group at once.
- Real time editing: Multiple users can edit the same note together. Changes sync instantly across every open window.
- Powerful search: A fast engine with OCR technology reads text inside images and PDFs. Search operators narrow big libraries down quickly.
- Flexible structure: Nested notebooks, nested tags, and inline hashtags help you organize information your own way.
- Permission control: View-only and comment-only access protect sensitive files. You can also see who opened a note and when.
- Connects with other apps: Slack, Trello, HubSpot, and Zoom all plug in. Live previews of Google Docs, Sheets, and Slides render inside a note.
What Our Team Noticed
Our writer signed up for Notejoy and used it for shared project notes over several days. Here is what stood out from that hands-on time:
Notejoy Pros & Cons
✅ Pros
- Pages load fast because the app stays lightweight
- Team libraries share every new note automatically
- Chatter adds comments, reactions, and @mentions inside a note
- You can link notes together with a double bracket shortcut
❌ Cons
- The free version is limited to 100MB of storage
- Search can feel clunky until you learn the search language
- No global keyboard shortcut to create a note from anywhere
What is Microsoft OneNote?
Microsoft OneNote is a note taking app developed by Microsoft.
It was built for free-form information gathering and multi-user collaboration.
You can capture notes, drawings, screen clippings, and audio commentaries.
The user interface borrows a notebook metaphor of sections and pages.
Click anywhere on a page and a text box appears where you clicked.
You can access OneNote as a free, stand-alone app from the official website and app stores.
The walkthrough below shows the layout in action.
🏆 Winner: Microsoft OneNote
A free digital notebook that runs on Windows, Mac, Android, iOS, and the web. Handwriting, audio, and OCR search all included.
Microsoft OneNote Pricing
Our database lists a single pricing entry for this product.
| Plan | Price | Best For |
|---|---|---|
| Standard | Contact for the exact pricing | Anyone taking notes across Windows, Mac, Android, and web |
Pricing verified July 2026.
Free trial: The app is free to download and use with a Microsoft account. No card is needed.
Money-back guarantee: Refunds follow standard Microsoft terms. Contact Microsoft support for details on your region.
📌 Note: The free version bundles 5GB of OneDrive cloud storage. A paid subscription to Microsoft 365 raises that to 1TB and unlocks premium features in other Microsoft apps too.
⚠️ Pricing conflict: Our database records “Contact for the exact pricing” for this product, while the app itself is free to download. Your real OneNote cost varies depending on whether you need a paid plan for more storage. Confirm current rates with Microsoft before you subscribe.
Key Benefits of Microsoft OneNote
Here is what makes OneNote worth considering:
- Genuinely free: Most of what OneNote offers costs nothing beyond a Microsoft account. There is no cap on how many notes each notebook holds.
- Runs everywhere: Windows, macOS, iOS, Android, and web. Sync across multiple devices carries no size limit and no cap on monthly uploads.
- Deep organization: Build multiple notebooks, then split each into colour-coded sections and pages to organize information hierarchically.
- Rich formatting: Fonts, text colours, and highlighting sit beside custom tags and custom templates for meeting notes or project plans.
- Office integration: It connects with Microsoft Office applications, so moving content between Microsoft Word, Excel, and PowerPoint stays simple.
- Real time co-authoring: Multiple users edit one file at the same time. You pick edit or view-only access when sharing notes.
This short clip runs through the standout benefits.
What Our Team Noticed
Our writer kept a research notebook in Microsoft OneNote across desktop and mobile for several weeks. Here is what stood out:
Microsoft OneNote Pros & Cons
✅ Pros
- Free across Windows, macOS, iOS, Android, and the web
- Unlimited notes per notebook with no monthly upload cap
- OCR technology finds text inside images and handwritten notes
- Record audio and video straight onto a page
❌ Cons
- Steep learning curve that can overwhelm new users
- Few export options make it hard to move notes elsewhere
- Formatting can shift between different platforms and devices
Feature Comparison
Ready for a closer look at Notejoy vs Microsoft OneNote?
We walk through ten features, then finish on price.
| Feature | Notejoy | Microsoft OneNote |
|---|---|---|
| Starting Price | Free, then $4 | Contact for the exact pricing |
| Free Plan | ✅ (100MB) | ✅ (5GB OneDrive) |
| Real Time Co-Editing | ✅ | ✅ |
| OCR Search | ✅ | ✅ |
| Web Clipper | ✅ | ✅ |
| Handwriting & Drawing Tools | ❌ | ✅ |
| Record Audio | ❌ | ✅ |
| Built-in AI | ❌ | ✅ (Copilot) |
| Offline Access | ✅ (paid tiers) | ✅ |
| Best For | Shared team libraries | Personal notebooks anywhere |
1. Note Taking and Composing
Notejoy: Composing is structured and quick. Markdown formatting works out of the box, and you can embed images, checklists, and code. That last part matters if a developer on your team pastes snippets all day.
Microsoft OneNote: Taking notes here feels like writing on paper. Click any spot and a text box lands there. Drawing tools let you sketch, annotate, and handwrite notes with a stylus.
⚠️ Warning: OneNote is not word processing software. For long documents, Microsoft Word remains the better tool.
2. Organizing Notes and Notebooks
Notejoy: Structure comes from nested notebooks, nested tags, and inline hashtags. You can star a note or link notes together with a double bracket shortcut. Bi-directional links help you connect related ideas.
A custom sidebar keeps your most-used libraries within reach.
Microsoft OneNote: The hierarchy is fixed: multiple notebooks, then sections, then pages. Colour-coded sections make each area easy to spot. Custom tags let you flag a task or an idea for later.
3. Real Time Collaboration
Notejoy: Several people can edit one note at once and see changes sync instantly. The Chatter panel adds comments, reactions, and @mentions beside the text. You can also see who viewed a note and when.
Microsoft OneNote: Co-authoring lets multiple users edit a single file at the same time. Sharing a notebook with other OneNote users takes a couple of clicks. You choose edit or view-only access for each person.
4. Team Libraries and Permissions
Notejoy: This is the core idea. A team library belongs to a project, department, or organisation, and every note added lands with all members. View-only and comment-only permissions protect anything sensitive.
Microsoft OneNote: Sharing happens one notebook at a time rather than through a group workspace. That works for a class or a small project. It gets messy once a dozen people each own notebooks.
5. Search Features and OCR Technology
Notejoy: A powerful search engine reads text inside images and PDFs. Search operators narrow results by library, tag, or author. The trade-off is that you have to learn that syntax first.
Microsoft OneNote: Optical Character Recognition digs through pictures and handwriting alike. Type a word and it surfaces across every notebook you own. Search features here are simpler and need no special syntax.
💡 Pro Tip: Test both search boxes on a scanned receipt before you commit. That single test tells you which engine fits how you work.
6. Web Clipper and Browser Extension
Notejoy: The web clipper is quick and accurate. Before you save, you can set the location and tags for the clip. That small step keeps a busy library tidy.
Microsoft OneNote: Its browser extension grabs an entire website, part of a page, or just the article body. Articles, web pages, and images all land in the notebook you pick.
7. Integrations With Other Apps
Notejoy: It plugs into Slack, Trello, HubSpot, and Zoom. Live previews of Google Docs, Sheets, and Slides render right inside a note. That keeps files from scattering across other apps.
Microsoft OneNote: Its strength is depth inside one family. Microsoft Office applications hand content back and forth easily, so a table can travel from Excel or a slide from PowerPoint. Outside Microsoft apps, the list thins out.
8. AI Features and Math Assistant
Notejoy: There is no built-in writing assistant. The app leans on speed and structure instead of generated text. For some teams that restraint is the selling point.
Microsoft OneNote: Copilot summarises long pages and pulls out key points. Math Assistant works through equations step by step, which students lean on. Both sit behind a Microsoft 365 subscription.
9. Record Audio and Voice Transcription
Notejoy: No native recorder. You attach audio files or videos as uploads, then reference them from the note. It is workable but not built for lecture capture.
Microsoft OneNote: You can record audio and video directly onto a page. Voice transcription turns that recording into searchable text. For lectures and long meetings, this is the clearest gap between the two.
10. Mobile Apps, Desktop, and Offline Access
Notejoy: Native builds cover Mac, Windows, iOS, Android, and the web. Feature parity across them is good. Offline access, though, is reserved for paid tiers.
Microsoft OneNote: The Windows version carries the most features. The Android version is a simplified version with fewer formatting controls on small screens. A web version of OneNote runs on any device with a browser, including Linux.
⚠️ Warning: OneNote functionality varies depending on the platform. Mobile apps drop options that the desktop version keeps, so check your main device first.
11. Pricing & Cost
Let’s put the plans side by side.
| Plan | Notejoy | Microsoft OneNote |
|---|---|---|
| Free | Free | Contact for the exact pricing |
| Solo | $4 | — |
| Plus | $8 | — |
| Premium | $12 | — |
Notejoy: Four clear tiers. The free plan is a real trial rather than a demo, but 100MB fills up fast once images arrive. The Solo plan at $4 is the sensible upgrade for one person.
Microsoft OneNote: Our database lists a contact-for-pricing entry, and the app itself downloads free. Costs only appear when you want more storage than the 5GB that ships with a Microsoft account.
Different Scenarios
| If You Need… | Choose | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Zero cost to start | Microsoft OneNote | Free with a Microsoft account |
| Shared team libraries | Notejoy | Auto-shares every new note |
| Handwriting on a tablet | Microsoft OneNote | Full pen and drawing tools |
| Slack or Trello links | Notejoy | Native third-party integrations |
| Lecture or meeting capture | Microsoft OneNote | Records audio onto the page |
| A fast, simple interface | Notejoy | Fewer menus to learn |
💰 Your Budget
Microsoft offers the OneNote app at no charge, so a tight budget points one way. Notejoy asks $4 per user once the 100MB free tier runs out.
🔌 Your Tech Stack
If your data already lives in Microsoft 365, OneNote slots in with no effort. If your team runs on Slack, Zoom, and Google Docs, Notejoy fits better.
📝 Your Note Taking Style
Sketchers and margin-scribblers will prefer OneNote’s open canvas and customization options. Typists who create notes in a hurry will prefer Notejoy’s structured pages.
🎓 Your Experience Level
OneNote has more depth, and that depth takes time to figure out. Notejoy is easier to learn but gives you fewer places to grow into.
🆓 Free Trials and Demos
Both let you start free with no card. Run the same week of real notes through each on your mobile devices before deciding.
🛟 Support Options
OneNote support arrives through Microsoft help articles and a large community forum. Notejoy handles questions over email, which is slower but more direct.
🔒 Data Privacy and Security
OneNote keeps everything on Microsoft servers, which some teams flag as a security concern. Notejoy adds end-to-end encryption on its premium tier.
Switching Guide
Already committed to one of them? Here is what changes if you move.
🔄 Switching from Notejoy to Microsoft OneNote?
✅ What you’ll gain:
- No storage bill, plus 5GB of OneDrive space
- Pen input, sketching, and audio recording on the page
- Copilot summaries and Math Assistant with a Microsoft 365 plan
❌ What you’ll lose:
- Auto-shared team libraries with per-person privileges
- Chatter comments and @mentions inside a note
- Slack, Trello, HubSpot, and Zoom connections
📋 How to switch:
- Export each Notejoy library to PDF or markdown
- Create a free Microsoft account and open OneNote
- Rebuild your top-level libraries as notebooks, then import pages
🔄 Switching from Microsoft OneNote to Notejoy?
✅ What you’ll gain:
- A shared workspace where new notes reach everyone
- View-only and comment-only permissions per document
- Read receipts showing who opened a note and when
❌ What you’ll lose:
- Handwriting, sketching, and stylus support
- On-page audio recording and voice transcription
- Free storage and tight Microsoft Office links
📋 How to switch:
- Export notebooks from the OneNote desktop app
- Sign up for Notejoy and build your first team library
- Paste pages in, then add tags and invite the team
What Our Review Didn’t Cover
This comparison focused on individuals and small teams. We did not test enterprise administration, single sign-on, or bulk licensing on either side. Long-term sync behaviour across very large libraries also sits outside what we looked at. If you manage fifty or more people, your priorities will differ from what we describe here.
Final Verdict
| Category | Winner |
|---|---|
| 💰 Pricing | Microsoft OneNote |
| 🚀 Core Note Taking | Microsoft OneNote |
| 🤝 Team Collaboration | Notejoy |
| 🔍 Search and OCR | Tie |
| ✍️ Handwriting and Audio | Microsoft OneNote |
| 🔌 Third-Party Integrations | Notejoy |
| 🏢 Microsoft Office Integration | Microsoft OneNote |
| 👶 Ease of Use | Notejoy |
| 🏆 Overall Winner | Microsoft OneNote |
🏆 WINNER: MICROSOFT ONENOTE
Microsoft OneNote takes four of the eight categories, with one tie.
Best for: Students, researchers, tablet users, and anyone who wants a capable notebook without a bill.
These two apps are chasing different users. OneNote wants to be your personal filing cabinet across every device you own.
Notejoy wants to be the shared brain for a working team. It is faster, cleaner, and better at permissions.
If collaborative knowledge management is the whole point, Notejoy earns the money. For everyone else, OneNote does more and costs nothing to start.
More of Notejoy Compared
Here is how Notejoy lines up against other rivals:
Notejoy wins on: team libraries that share automatically, per-document view and comment permissions, lighter pages that open faster
Evernote wins on: a more accurate web clipper, a deeper personal knowledge library, stronger OCR on scanned documents
Notejoy vs Notion
Notejoy wins on: speed on large libraries, a shorter setup before the first note, read receipts on shared pages
Notion wins on: databases and relational views, a template gallery, wiki-style site publishing
Notejoy vs Craft
Notejoy wins on: Windows and Android parity, search operators for big archives, Slack and Trello hooks
Craft wins on: typography and document polish, offline-first behaviour on Apple hardware, nicer export formats
More of Microsoft OneNote Compared
Here is how OneNote holds up against other names:
OneNote wins on: unlimited notes on the free tier, syncing without a paid upgrade, pen and sketch input
Evernote wins on: clipping accuracy, sharper character recognition, a more polished paid experience
OneNote wins on: free-form page layout, handwriting capture, offline reliability on Windows
Notion wins on: structured databases, cleaner sharing links, a far larger template library for teams
Microsoft OneNote vs ClickUp
OneNote wins on: raw note capture speed, ink and audio on the page, zero cost for individuals
ClickUp wins on: task boards and assignments, workload reporting, automation rules across projects
Frequently Asked Questions
Is OneNote actually free?
Yes. The app is free with a Microsoft account and includes 5GB of OneDrive storage. Microsoft 365 adds 1TB and extra perks, but the notebook features work without paying.
How much does OneNote cost?
Our database lists it as contact for the exact pricing. The app itself downloads free, and you only pay if you want a Microsoft 365 plan.
Is Notejoy free?
Yes, there is a free tier. It caps storage at 100MB and leaves offline access to paid plans. Solo starts at $4 per user.
Is Notejoy safe?
It offers permission controls, view-only sharing, and end-to-end encryption on premium tiers. Treat it like any cloud tool and read the security page before storing sensitive material.
Which is the best free notes app?
For most people, OneNote. Unlimited notes, 5GB of space, and no sync limits beat what rivals give away. Notejoy wins only if shared team libraries matter more.
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