Microsoft OneNote

OneNote has been around since 2011 and Microsoft keeps it genuinely current, with a June 2026 update on the books. It is a free, 365 MB note-taking app that organizes content into notebooks and sections, syncs across devices, supports digital ink, captures voice, and now layers in Copilot AI features for summarization and audio overviews. The million-plus ratings averaging 4.71 suggest a broad, satisfied user base, though free access paired with potential in-app purchases deserves a closer look.

The Copilot Layer Changes the Workflow

The most meaningful recent addition is Copilot integration inside notebooks. You can feed it your meeting or class notes and ask it to produce a summary, which cuts review time noticeably. The audio overview feature, where the app generates a spoken digest from your own notes, is a genuinely different take on revision. These are not cosmetic additions. They push OneNote past simple capture and into something closer to an active study or work assistant.

Ink and Voice Still Hold Up

Digital ink support lets you sketch or handwrite directly on a page, and the voice transcription gives you a hands-free capture option that saves the audio alongside a text transcript. For students in lectures or professionals in fast-moving meetings, that combination reduces the friction of note-taking considerably. The hierarchical notebook structure, notebooks containing sections containing pages, is familiar enough that new users rarely feel lost getting started.

Where the Experience Gets Complicated

At 365 MB the install footprint is heavy for a notes app. The free tier works, but the in-app purchase flag raises a real question about which Copilot features require a Microsoft 365 subscription to unlock fully. Users without that subscription may find the AI highlights are essentially a preview rather than a full tool. The app also leans hard into the Microsoft ecosystem, so people working primarily in Google Workspace or Apple Notes will feel some friction.