Evernote Smart Notebook

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The Evernote Notebooks by Moleskine are the first paper notebooks specifically designed for users who would like to create digitized versions of handwritten notes. Evernote not only captures your physical notes, but optimizes them and seamlessly integrates them with Evernote accounts. Evernote Smart Notebook features unique 'Evernote ruled' and 'Evernote squared' page styles with dotted lines designed to ensure a clean image when digitally capturing your notebook. Smart Stickers introduce Smart Tagging into your workflow.

Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.

Each month, Field Test columnist and contributing editor Jenna Schnuer tries out gadgets and services designed to simplify life on the road.

Moleskine Smart Notebook

There are only a few apps to which I’m absolutely devoted and atop that list sits Evernote. It’s my go-to for everything from taking (and storing) notes for articles and books, to jotting down gift ideas for my nieces. I keep my to-do lists for personal and work on Evernote and the app is front and center on both of my computers, my phone and my iPad. I’m more than just a little attached.

Evernote smart notebook review

On the paper side of life, I have a similar love for Moleskine notebooks. (Yes, I’m a bit of a writer cliché on that front but so are most of my friends.) They’re so pretty. The notebooks. Not my friends. Some of my friends. Anyway, whatever.

So how to make the two work together? The two companies teamed up last year to introduce an Evernote-specific line of notebooks. Well, I started eyeballing them—but just eyeballing them. Regular Moleskine notebooks are already a pricey $18.95 and even devotees like myself search them out on sale. Was the bump up to $29.95 for the Evernote Smart Notebook worth it? Would that really make the paper-to-digital flow that much better?

The product’s promise: The notebook pages feature special dotted lines (choice of ruled or grid) that, when photographed using the camera in the Evernote smartphone app, optimize the image and increase the quality of search on your handwritten notes. “Cleaner page captures mean it can be easier for us to do the handwriting recognition on the backend,” says a spokeswoman. Also, the notebooks come with “smart stickers” that, during the photo-to-Evernote process, automatically tell Evernote where it should file the notes. You can assign each of the six category stickers to a specific notebook. Each notebook comes with two or three months of premium Evernote membership, a $5 per month value. Already a premium subscriber? You’ll receive points good for extending your subscription or other services.

Our reality: I’m going back to regular Moleskines. Before the launch of the Evernote Smart Notebook, I’d snapped photos of regular Moleskine notebook pages for use with Evernote (either by scanning or by taking a smartphone photo). The handwriting recognition already worked well enough. Not perfect. But well enough. No big complaints. When using the Smart Notebooks, I didn’t see much of a difference in the quality of the results on searching my handwritten notes photographed from a regular Moleskine notebook page (or, even, any old blank page) than using the Evernote version.

Notebook

And the stickers? I have loads more notebooks than there are available Smart Stickers. I’ll never just have an “ideas” notebook; I have a “culture ideas,” “Alaska ideas,” “book ideas,” and on and on. Unfortunately, there’s no plan to add more sticker types, according to a spokeswoman.

Moleskine Evernote Ruled Smart Notebook

Smart

It’s not a bad product, it’s just … fine. That said, the Evernote version doesn’t offer enough of a bump up in utility in order to justify the price. In the meantime, I can cobble together fine all on my own. Evernote and Moleskine are still my magic brands, however, and I’m still hopeful that Evernote’s new alliance with Post-it® Notes is going to change my life. Hey, it could happen…

I just received my Evernote Smart Notebook from Moleskine. I have been wanting to try this paper/digital tool for a while. The Evernote technology is able to “read” your handwriting and make it searchable within your notes. As a principal, I could document meeting notes electronically and not having to lug around technology all the time. Students could also potentially use these notebooks to curate their writing and create digital portfolios.

Moleskine Smart Notebook Review

I tried it out by copying down some information from Richard Allington’s book What Really Matters in Response to Intervention. I took a picture with my iPad, then searched for the word “lesson” within that new note. Here was the result:

Evernote

Pretty cool, right? My handwriting is not the best, yet Evernote still managed to capture the appropriate word.

When I showed my notebook to my office assistant, she asked if Evernote could read handwriting in any Moleskine notebook. To find out, I used my read aloud Moleskine notebook containing notes on different books I like to share with students. Picture taken and new note created, I searched for “audio”.

Moleskine Evernote Smart Notebook Review

As you can see, it does work.

This bears the question: Is the Evernote Smart Notebook worth it?

I would say yes. You need Evernote Premium to be able to search within images and PDFs. Three months of the Premium subscription comes with a Smart Notebook ($30). In addition, these specialized notebooks have different stickers you can put on a note (see second image). Each sticker can be customized to digitally associate with an Evernote notebook and tags within your account. These stickers could be a real time saver.

Evernote Smart Notebook Review

Evernote Smart Notebook

Even though a regular Moleskine notebook is half the price ($15), the Evernote Premium is nice in that you get a lot more storage – 1 GB a month instead of 60 MB. It’s a nice way to try out Premium and the sticker technology. However, if you already subscribe to Evernote Premium ($45/year) and don’t mind taking a few extra steps to organize your handwriting, the technology appears to scan either type of page.

Moleskine Evernote-smart-notebook

Have you tried the Evernote Smart Notebook? What has been your experience? Please share in the comments.