Google Keep vs Evernote vs Apple Notes
Who can remember everything for you?
Google Keep vs Evernote vs Apple Notes: security
There are two kinds of security to think about here: security in the sense of how well your data and personal information is protected, and security in terms of whether your chosen service will still be around in the not too distant future.
Evernote scores badly in the former and Google in the latter: Evernote recently suffered a major data breach, forcing users to change their passwords, and Google famously canned Google Reader this month, the latest in a very long list of once-promising services it's since shut down. In many respects Keep is rather like Google Notebook, and that one got the bullet back in 2006.
The end of Google Reader is certainly enough to convince some people that Keep isn't worth investing time or data in, but we suspect that its future is rosier than Reader: it's part of Google Drive and integration with Google+ is clearly coming, so you're looking at a Pinterest-style app that can help Google in its mission to know all about you and to sell ads based on that knowledge.
Google Keep vs Evernote vs iOS Notes: first impressions
It's probably unfair to judge Keep just yet: it's a bare bones release that will clearly get more powerful very quickly, especially if third party apps can tie into it. But is it ready for you to embrace it yet? If you're on iOS or on a desktop, we reckon the answer is no: the web version doesn't do very much, and there are plenty of apps and web apps that do much more or do it more elegantly (Clear on iOS, OneNote Mobile, the myriad To-Do and Getting Things Done apps on all platforms and so on).
On Android, however, we'd say a qualified yes if you don't already have any productivity apps: it's a simple and effective program that's particularly handy on Jelly Bean. For hardcore note-takers, idea-jotters and receipt-filers, however, Evernote leaves Google Keep in its dust.
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Writer, broadcaster, musician and kitchen gadget obsessive Carrie Marshall has been writing about tech since 1998, contributing sage advice and odd opinions to all kinds of magazines and websites as well as writing more than a dozen books. Her memoir, Carrie Kills A Man, is on sale now and her next book, about pop music, is out in 2025. She is the singer in Glaswegian rock band Unquiet Mind.