Here are two issues that I generally face with Evernote:
- Sync: many times, it takes too long to sync. I want something on my phone, so I will save it on Mac and then get ready to leave but it will take 10-15 minutes to sync to phone. (Even after forcing sync on both devices multiples times)
- Editor: The editor has been stagnant for too long and has lots of issues. Undo does not work reliably if you paste something from other apps, there's no Markdown support.
Also, iOS app is too bloated and generally slow. I have resorted to using Drafts as my note taking app and then saving to EN.
Your experience regarding sync is odd - the model I use Evernote in, is I take notes on my laptop, and then, just before slapping it closed, I CMD+S, wait for the sync Icon to stop spinning (usually about 10 seconds) - and then slap my laptop closed. Then, while I'm walking, or in a cab, or otherwise not connected to my laptop, I bring up my iPhone, Click on the sync button there - and after a few seconds, I'm up to date. I've been using Evernote pretty consistently like this for the last year+, and I'm struggling to remember if I've ever had a sync issue.
You mention that you have taken notes on the IOS app - I've never done that, so that might be one difference between us.
I do have a paid membership though, and I recently downgraded from Premium to the new $2.70/month "Plus" category. It will be interesting to see if there is any impact to sync speed.
Mostly my experience is similar to you but I have seen the delay in sync a few times recently. I was a Premium customer for a year or so but their lack of a proper Firefox extension (back in 2013-14) made me switch to free. I upgraded to plus again recently.
This reminds me of how bad their Firefox extension was for a year or so. They introduced new version of clipper (6) for Chrome, Opera and Safari but Firefox stayed at 5.9 for almost a year. They had a long forum thread about this but took too much time! As a paying customer, I hated that and still feel that for a company with main focus on note taking and clipping, they should have been faster.
Yes, something I feel there's a great need for. Perhaps I'm unusual, but most of my notes in Evernote I wish could contain structured data, so I can make better use of their contents, both in my life and cross-referenced in other notes. E.g. I record foods I like, places I've eaten (my private TripAdvisor) and structuring that data would be really useful for plotting on a map, making lists and the rest.
