The iOS App Store is littered with beautiful hyper-minimalist text-editing apps – if you want to take quick, searchable, syncable notes on your iPhone, you’re not short of options. The Android landscape is comparatively barren, with only a few options that work and even fewer that look good doing it. But thanks to Simplenote, which has launched its first native app for Android, there’s now an option that rivals anything you’d find on iOS.
Best New Apps: Simplenote for Android
is editor-at-large and Vergecast co-host with over a decade of experience covering consumer tech. Previously, at Protocol, The Wall Street Journal, and Wired.
The app is just one long, running list of notes you’ve taken, black text on a white background. Press the plus button to add another note and just start typing. You can sort by tags or pin certain notes to the top of the list, but Simplenote is designed to work like Gmail: you want something, you search for it. Search is instant and ongoing, reorganizing your list with every character you type. Everything is kept up to date with Simplenote’s web service, and there are apps for almost every platform that sync with its backend; if you don’t want to sign up, you can just use the app on your phone.
Not many options, but that's mostly a good thing
The app is incredibly basic, almost to a fault; you can’t change the sans-serif font, or even the font size. The text you’re searching for isn’t highlighted, so searching for a relatively common word isn’t always useful. But Simplenote is still one of the first attractive, easy, in-sync text editors Android’s ever had — and whether you’re a habitual diarist or just need to remember that great idea you had that one time, it’s come not a moment too soon.
The app is free for Android phones and tablets.
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Sean O'Kane
Sean O'Kane
Sean O'Kane
