I used to love Joplin, but it just doesn’t compare to its competitors

Joplin first launched in 2017, following Notion and several other note-taking apps. At the time, it was good. But as the years have gone by, Joplin has begun to feel a bit outdated. It doesn’t stack up against its competitors the way it once did, and there’s not a world where I could see myself choosing it over Notion or Obsidian.

Don’t get me wrong; Joplin isn’t bad. It’s just that everything it can do, something else does better. Joplin Cloud is a paid option for syncing notes, and self-hosted alternatives can be hard to set up.

Sorry, Joplin. It’s not me; it’s you.

The interface is outdated

Joplin feels stuck in the past

Out of the box, Joplin’s basic three-pane layout isn’t what I would call eye-catching. Sure, you can make it look better with enough work, but compared to Obsidian’s customizable workspaces and Canvas or Notion’s impressive template options, it just feels dull. Strictly speaking, Joplin doesn’t need a modern interface to be useful. You can take notes just like in any other application, but the lack of appealing aesthetics makes the experience a lot less pleasurable.

Taking notes is part of work, but Joplin makes it feel like work. The interface is a symphony of gray, and even alternative layouts like a Kanban board are unwieldy thanks to the inflexibility of the three-pane system. From a more practical standpoint, some elements do not scale properly and end up wasting a lot of screen real estate.

The plugin ecosystem is practically nonexistent

The Great Plugin desert

Plugins are a key element of any open-source software, allowing users to customize functionality to suit specific needs. Joplin does have plugins, but its options are severely limited compared to either Obsidian or Notion. The exact number of Joplin plugins isn’t known, but Obsidian offers more than 2,400 choices, and Notion has well over 1,100. You likely won’t need even a fraction of those—I only use a handful myself—but it’s better to have more options than fewer. Joplin has hundreds of plugins, but it doesn’t have thousands (and if it does, they’re well-hidden).

That said, Joplin does outperform Notion in one area: it has a built-in plugin marketplace. With Notion, plugins have to be manually installed, but both Joplin and Obsidian have built-in marketplaces that make discovering new plugins and enabling them as easy as clicking a few buttons. Obsidian has a sort of plugin browser, while Joplin has a search function. It’s not quite as easy to find new plugins with Joplin, but it’s still simpler than manually installing a file.

Collaborative features are merely a dream

Teamwork makes the dream work, till it doesn’t

Notion supports real-time collaboration and editing, and Obsidian offers shared vaults. Joplin launched Joplin Cloud in 2021 to address the lack of other collaborative features, but it’s a bit too little, too late. For starters, it’s expensive; a single gigabyte of storage is $3 per month ($30 annually), with a size limit of 10MB per note. If you want to upgrade to the Pro plan, that will set you back $6 per month (or $60 annually) with 10GB of storage and 200MB per note. Though Joplin Cloud promises you can “collaborate on notebooks with your friends, family, and colleagues,” the functionality is limited compared to Notion.

Even with the added features Joplin Cloud brings to the table, it doesn’t address the core issues at the heart of the application. The user interface doesn’t change, and it’s better if we just don’t speak of the mobile experience. In addition, all of Joplin’s servers are located in France. There is a point to be made that it means better privacy due to the GDPR, but it means there aren’t regional billing options. The relatively high $3 per month cost for a limited amount of storage is even more pronounced in regions where the Euro is powerful.

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Despite its flaws, Joplin can still be worth using

Privacy and accessibility are the main focuses

I’d be remiss to talk about my gripes with Joplin without addressing the features that still make it worth consideration, despite everything else. First of all, your Joplin notes are stored as Markdown files. That means you can view them in basically any text editor. It’s also extremely privacy-focused, utilizing proper end-to-end encryption even with its cloud services. If your notes contain sensitive, proprietary data, Joplin is a safer option than many of its competitors.

And while I don’t love the Joplin app, it does exist and maintains feature parity with the desktop version. Syncing notes across the two versions is unwieldy, but I don’t have to worry that a feature I need won’t be present on the mobile app.

I’m still leaving Joplin behind

The pros aren’t worth the cons

I’m not overly concerned about privacy with regard to my notes. Without context, most of mine are just collections of information that I write down, since paper, in this case, data, is more reliable than gray matter. The collaborative features of Notion, paired with the creativity-focused, visual aspects of Obsidian, make them both better options for my particular workflow. Of course, not everyone will feel the same. Joplin would be a stronger contender if I were taking notes that could be considered critical to a company (or notes that had to stay private, such as HIPAA information).

But I’m not taking those kinds of notes, and I prefer more visually appealing interfaces with a wide range of customization options. Joplin’s competitors excel in those areas.

It’s a marathon, not a sprint

Joplin is still in development. Who’s to say it won’t improve and pull me back in a few years from now? Or perhaps my needs will change. I won’t say that I’ll never come back to Joplin, but for now, I find it no longer competes with the likes of Notion, Obsidian, or other note-taking apps on the market. The note-taking space no longer looks the way it did in 2017, and with so many different options all competing to be the one-and-only note-taking app, Joplin has a lot of catching up to do.