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It’s been a while since Evernote and I went on our separate ways. The transition to life outside of the Green Elephant club was hard at the beginning. Evernote was not just an app, it was also a mental state. There are several apps I use today to replace Evernote, and I’m still evaluating most of them. One solid app I can start the discussion with is definitely staying in my new workflow: Google Keep.

Change in Thinking

Google Keep (available in your Google Drive, keep.google.com) is my go-to mental notes app. On Evernote, my default notebook was called “oh snap!” It was an offline notebook I used to capture everything and anything, to be later sorted out.

As it turned out, many of the notes within “oh snap!” became useless and at least half of the notes in this notebook were trash waiting to happen. Going through “oh snap!” and cleaning it became a necessary weekly ceremony; I had to do it or things would get ugly.

I also learned, after using this system for some time, that “oh snap!” made me lazy. Storing information in a system for storing everything kept me from “upgrading” information to what it should be. Pictures of WiFi passwords, reminders that needed scheduling in a calendar, locations that belong in a map… All this led to problems. I forgot the right tags, or had the same information recorded many times because I forgot I captured it already.

Google keep was not designed to save information long term, and that’s a good thing. If I have a note in Google Keep, I constantly ask myself if I still need it, and if so, why is it still in Keep and not where it probably belongs.

Why does Google Keep Work?

A segment of my Google Keep “stream.” Colors represent categories, location in the stream represent importance (important notes at the top).

It’s visual

Google Keep is beautifully visual. One quick look and I can tell everything: summaries, context and urgency. This is because each note displays a summery, has a certain color, and has a specific place on my screen. For example, blog post ideas are in green, work related topics in yellow, and things to do are in orange. I can move notes around easily so the more important notes are at the top of my list.

It’s super fast

Google Keep loads within a second on my phone (and I have an old Nexus 4), ready to go. Previews are available offline as well as a large part of the notes themselves. On Evernote, I had to pay to get offline content for my notes. I don’t remember when was the last time I opened a note on Keep and it wasn’t available within seconds, even on the subway.

I can also swipe notes out of view. It might sound like a silly thing, but this is huge. Notes that are swiped are not deleted, just achieved. Remember “oh snap!” and the purging ceremony? Not anymore. With Keep, I swipe all the time. Besides, it’s fun to swipe things away and get rid of tasks.

It’s Google, and it shows.

Gone are the days of waiting on Evernote to release Android updates. Gone the interface that looks different on every machine I use: Mac, Android and a Chromebook. The notes on my Android match the notes on my Chromebook which match the notes on my Mac at work. The only difference is that I see more of them on a bigger screen, and I can resize the app’s window any way I want.

Google Now works perfectly with Keep, as you’d expect. While you could set up Evernote to work with Google Now as well, the integration is smoother with Keep. I used to think that talking to my phone is silly, but speaking a quick thought is so much faster. Google Keep also records voice with the dictation, so I have a recording of what I said both in text and in audio. I wish I ask Google to also pick a color for a note, but I’m sure it’s only a matter of time before this happens as well.

Google Keep is not Evernote.

As I explained, Google Keep is limited. It’s not a good place to organize and store notes long-term. Even with the new labels and recurring reminders, Google Keep’s focus is on quick notes. I do not store long-term items on Keep nor do I intend to do so; these items should go somewhere else.

Google Keep is not the only app I use to replace Evernote, but it’s a key component of my new system. If you have an Android phone and haven’t been using it because of Evernote addiction (as was the case with me), I recommend you give it a try.