Joplin is an open source note-taking app
Open-source note-taking app Joplin is being weighed against rivals like Obsidian, Evernote, and newer Qt-based tools, with users trading off performance, UX polish, and data portability. Many appreciate Joplin’s encryption, self-hostable sync server, WebDAV support, and cross-platform availability, but criticize its Electron-based slowness on some systems, non-standard storage structure, and weaker mobile experience. Obsidian earns praise for its plugin ecosystem and use of plain files, yet raises concerns around paid sync, closed source code, and weaker built-in OCR compared to Joplin’s Tesseract integration.
Overall sentiment on Joplin
- Seen as a solid, open‑source, cross‑platform note‑taking app that “does its job well” for many day‑to‑day workflows.
- Several Evernote migrants say they kept most functionality and accept a less polished UI in exchange for openness and control.
- Others find it clunky, slow to launch (especially on Windows and some M1 Macs), and weaker than newer tools in UX and mobile design.
Sync, storage, and lock‑in
- Popular sync options: OneDrive, Dropbox, Google Drive, WebDAV (e.g., Synology), and Joplin’s self‑hosted sync server; built‑in end‑to‑end encryption is appreciated.
- Some report OneDrive flagging encrypted data as suspicious, Dropbox sync being slow, and no background sync on mobile leading to delays and conflicts.
- Android + Syncthing is contentious: works only up to version 2.5 according to some; above that, data is not read.
- Major criticism: Joplin restructures notes into a SQLite DB and UUID‑named markdown/resources in a config directory. This makes using shell tools, other editors, or direct filesystem workflows awkward.
- Others counter that SQLite is easy to work with, export scripts exist, and the format is not truly “proprietary.”
Comparison with Obsidian and other tools
- Obsidian is frequently cited as more performant, more polished, and with a huge plugin ecosystem; its use of plain markdown files in normal folders is a major draw.
- Obsidian downsides: closed source; built‑in sync is paid; third‑party sync (iCloud, git, Syncthing, cloud drives) can be finicky or slow.
- For heavy PDF/OCR workflows, some suggest Zotero, DEVONthink, or specialized citation/document managers rather than note apps.
- Other alternatives mentioned: QOwnNotes, TagSpaces, zim‑wiki + Markor, The Archive, Craft, and a new Qt‑based app (Plume) focused on performance.
Performance, UX, and feature gaps
- Electron is blamed by some for memory use and lag; others report Joplin is fast, especially with ARM builds or smaller note sets.
- Mobile UX, particularly on Android and iPad, is widely criticized as awkward and slow for rapid multi‑note workflows.
- Desired features include better table editing, stronger OCR, polished WYSIWYG with Vim bindings, more flexible media handling, and a storage model that doesn’t fight existing folder structures.
Security and plugins
- Concern that Joplin’s plugin system is not sandboxed; plugins could, in principle, exfiltrate data.
- Local encryption behavior of notes is unclear; one commenter avoided Joplin for highly sensitive data due to past unencrypted local storage.