Google Keep alternatives
Google Keep is great for a shopping list and terrible for 400 saved links and screenshots. The alternatives, depending on whether you take notes or keep references.
TLDR
- Google Keep is brilliant for quick notes, lists, and reminders. It was never built to hold hundreds of links and screenshots.
- No folders, link previews that are just a title, and screenshots that sit there as images.
- If you mostly write notes, try Apple Notes or Obsidian. If you mostly save things, try Savepad or Raindrop.
Where Keep stops working
Keep is the sticky note on your fridge. Open it, type “oat milk”, done. A lot of us also started dumping links and screenshots into it because it was there. Fast forward two years and there are 900 cards in a masonry wall with no folders and labels you stopped using in month three.
The specific problems:
- No folders. Labels only, and you can’t nest them.
- Links are just links. You get a title and a favicon. If the page dies, it’s gone.
- Screenshots are pictures. You can pull text out of an image, one at a time, by asking. Search won’t find “free shipping” inside 200 screenshots.
If you mostly write notes
Apple Notes if you’re on Apple everything. Folders, tags, decent search, and it’s already on your phone.
Obsidian if you want your notes as plain files you own, linked to each other.
Notion if you want databases and your team is already there.
Evernote if you want the old-school notes-plus-clipper, though its free plan is 50 notes now.
If you mostly save things
Savepad is built for this exact pile: links, screenshots, PDFs, notes, emails, places. Every link gets a full-page snapshot, every screenshot gets its text read, and search finds a phrase across all of it. Folders inside folders, tags, and as many spaces as you like, so work and home stay apart. On Android you can install it and share straight into it, on iPhone you email things to your own Savepad address. The save from your phone docs show how.
Raindrop if it’s mostly links. Free, fast, everywhere.
Getting your stuff out of Keep
Google Takeout exports Keep as HTML and JSON files, one per note. For the links, it’s quickest to search Keep for “http”, copy them into a spreadsheet, and import the CSV. Screenshots download from Takeout as images; drag the folder into Savepad and the text in each one gets read for search.
And if your screenshots are mostly sitting on your Mac desktop, organizing screenshots on a Mac is the post for that.
FAQ
Does Google Keep have folders?
No. Keep has labels, colours, and pins, but no folders or nested structure. That's fine for 50 notes and hard work at 500.
Can Google Keep search the text in screenshots?
Keep can grab text from an image if you ask it to, one image at a time. It doesn't keep a searchable full-page copy of links you save.
What's the best Google Keep alternative for notes?
For notes, Apple Notes, Obsidian, or Notion. For saving links, screenshots, and files you need to find again, a bookmark or swipe file app like Savepad or Raindrop.