Evernote
Free (limited) / Starter ~$8.25 per mo
OneNote
Free (with a Microsoft account)
Evernote is a polished capture-and-search note app with strong web clipping, but its free tier is now limited and paid plans rose. OneNote is free, flexible, and great within Microsoft 365, with a freeform canvas. Evernote wins on capture and search; OneNote wins on price and flexibility.
Pick Evernote if you rely on fast capture, powerful search, and best-in-class web clipping, and will pay for it.
Pick OneNote if you want a free, flexible notebook with a freeform canvas, especially if you use Microsoft 365.
Evernote and OneNote are two of the longest-running note apps, and price now separates them sharply. Evernote is a mature capture-and-search tool with excellent web clipping and powerful search across years of notes, but after the Bending Spoons acquisition its free tier became tightly limited and its paid plans rose. OneNote is Microsoft's notebook: free with a Microsoft account, built around a flexible freeform canvas, and tightly integrated with Microsoft 365.
On price, Evernote's free tier is heavily limited and its Starter plan is around $8.25 a month (Advanced around $20.83), while OneNote is free for anyone with a Microsoft account. The choice is mostly capture, search, and web clipping (Evernote) versus a free, flexible notebook (OneNote).
We compare capture, search, web clipping, price, and flexibility.
| Quick facts | Evernote | OneNote |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free (limited) / Starter ~$8.25/mo | Free (Microsoft account) |
| Web clipping | Best-in-class | Good |
| Search | Best-in-class | Strong |
| Freeform canvas | Limited | Best-in-class |
| Best for | Capture + search | Free + flexible notebook |
Each row reflects the feature on each product's current public release.
| Feature | E Evernote | O OneNote |
|---|---|---|
| Fast capture | Best-in-class | Strong |
| Powerful search | Best-in-class | Strong |
| Web clipper | Best-in-class | Good |
| Freeform / canvas notes | Limited | Best-in-class |
| Microsoft 365 integration | Limited | Native |
| Free tier | Heavily limited | Fully free |
| Document / image OCR search | Yes | Good |
| Lower price | No | Yes |
Pricing and features change often. Always verify the current details on each product's official site. Last reviewed 2026-06-23.
Things neither product's marketing page leads with.
Evernote's capture, search, and clipping are excellent, but its limited free tier and higher prices push many users away.
OneNote is free and flexible, but its organization and search are less refined than Evernote's for heavy archives.
For a free option OneNote is hard to beat; for a power capture-and-retrieve workflow Evernote still leads, at a cost.
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See how the price has moved