MD & DO App Recommendations that seamlessly crossover?

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adrenalinejunkie

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Hi! I'm starting medical school in the Fall and I was wondering, what app did you find that best worked on both your iPad and computer? For example, with Apple's Notes app, I can edit a Note on my iPad, and that change is reflected on my MacBook instantaneously. I've heard students recommend Notability, GoodNotes, Evernote, and OneNote, but do these apps have similar crossover that is seamless? I'd like to be able to take notes on both my iPad and computer in class without there being "two versions" if that makes sense. Trying to get feedback before I fork over money for these apps. Thanks in advance for the advice!

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I love PDF Expert for reading PDF's and other files, I download and save texts and make notes, I use it for highlighting and writing in the texts and a lot more. It is really easy to crossover in the ways you said between different devices. It was pricier though (I think I paid $9.99) but completely worth it in my opinion. It is better than GoodReader in my opinion, less buggy. Personally I didn't like EverNote.

I like Notability for note-taking. It is good, but not great. But I don't know of anything better for Apple. Apple Notes is OK.

If you or your school mostly use Microsoft products, then maybe OneNote would be best, but I didn't like it that much. But some people love it.
 
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I use Notability. I take notes on my iPad Pro and have it set up to push to my phone via iCloud. I did end up having to buy more iCloud storage about halfway trough MS1, but it's $0.99/mo for 50GB of cloud storage. As long as I remember to exit the app, I've had no problems with cloud transfer from my iPad to my phone and vice versa.
 
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I love PDF Expert for reading PDF's and other files, I download and save texts and make notes, I use it for highlighting and writing in the texts and a lot more. It is really easy to crossover in the ways you said between different devices. It was pricier though (I think I paid $9.99) but completely worth it in my opinion. It is better than GoodReader in my opinion, less buggy. Personally I didn't like EverNote.

I like Notability for note-taking. It is good, but not great. But I don't know of anything better for Apple. Apple Notes is OK.

If you or your school mostly use Microsoft products, then maybe OneNote would be best, but I didn't like it that much. But some people love it.

I tried GoodNotes, and I really wasn't impressed by the interface - even with an Adonit pixel, it was still buggy, so I'm glad I'm not the only one who thinks that! Sounds like PDF Expert is the same price as Notability, so what is the difference between the two?
 
I tried GoodNotes, and I really wasn't impressed by the interface - even with an Adonit pixel, it was still buggy, so I'm glad I'm not the only one who thinks that! Sounds like PDF Expert is the same price as Notability, so what is the difference between the two?
Definitely! I agree with you here. I thoguht GoodNotes was OK, but I liked PDF Expert much more. (Although if I'm being fair, maybe some of this is personal preference or subjective factors.)

The basic difference between PDF Expert and Notability is that PDF Expert allows you to open, read, edit, and annotate PDF's (and I think other types of files, like I've also used it to read Microsoft files - Word and Powerpoint). So PDF Expert is very similar to GoodNotes, but I believe more powerful and just better overall. Notability however is more like having a blank notepad and being able to write (or draw) anything you want on it. (I use Apple Pencil but there are other third party styluses you can use. Apple Pencil hasn't given me any problems so far. I like it.) Unless I have been using PDF Expert wrong, I don't think PDF Expert allows you to create something new from a completely blank document like Notability does. I use Notability to take lecture notes, patient notes, and even just notes to myself. For example, you can draw the cardiovascular system, color it red and blue, color different muscle layers different colors, write notes next to the illustrations or diagrams, and much more.

It's probably easier to explain by just watching a video on each. Like just go to Youtube and search PDF Expert or Notability and you'll find people using these apps and showing you what each is like. And here are their websites - PDF Expert and Notability. Hope that helps!
 
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