Goodnotes Price 2026: What Does Each Plan Really Cost You?

Goodnotes stopped being a one-time purchase a while ago, and the question people now type into Google is simply "how much is Goodnotes a year?" Here is the answer as it stands on goodnotes.com/pricing on November 1, 2026, plan by plan, followed by who should pay for which tier and what a cheaper route looks like if handwriting is not your main thing.

Goodnotes pricing at a glance (checked November 1, 2026)

| Plan | Price | Billing | What you get | Where it runs | |---|---|---|---|---| | Free | $0 | Free forever | Up to 3 files, 20 minutes of audio recording, core note-taking and PDF markup, watermarked exports, link sharing | Apple, Android, Windows, web | | Essential | $11.99 | Per year, 7-day free trial | Unlimited files and audio, all note-taking tools, limited AI, export without watermark | Apple, Android, Windows, web (no cloud library sync between Apple and non-Apple devices) | | Pro | $35.99 | Per year, 7-day free trial | Everything in Essential plus Google Drive integration, private link sharing, real-time collaboration, sync across devices, advanced AI, Goodnotes Cloud library sync | Apple, Android, Windows, web | | Special Edition | One-time (not printed on the pricing page; $35.99 on the US App Store) | Pay once | Unlimited Apple note-taking without a subscription, limited AI, no Goodnotes Cloud | Apple only | | AI Pass (add-on) | +$9.99 | Per month | Advanced AI features and about 12 times more AI credits | On Special Edition, Essential or Pro where offered | | Teams | $120 per seat | Per year, 30-day trial | Everything in Pro plus SAML SSO, domain control, consolidated billing, admin console, Outlook calendar integration | Apple, Android, Windows | | Enterprise | Custom | Contract | Teams plus privacy and security requests, AI permissions, dedicated support, Intune App SDK (iOS) | Custom |

Prices are shown in US dollars on the pricing page. They differ by country and by storefront, so the figure you see in the App Store or Play Store can be a little higher or lower than the website.

How much is Goodnotes a year, really?

• Essential: $11.99 a year, which is about $1 a month. This is the plan most students land on. It removes the 3-file cap and the watermark, and that is what most people actually need.
• Pro: $35.99 a year, about $3 a month. You are paying for sync between devices, collaboration and the stronger AI tools. If you only ever use one iPad, Pro is mostly wasted.
• Special Edition: a single payment, Apple-only, and it does not include Goodnotes Cloud. People who bought Goodnotes 6 outright keep this tier. If you want a one-time price and you live entirely on Apple hardware, this is the one, but check the App Store price in your country before you assume $35.99.
• AI Pass: $9.99 a month on top of whichever plan you have. Over a year that is more than the Pro subscription itself, so only add it if you lean on the AI features daily.

Goodnotes Essential price: what it leaves out

The Essential tier is a genuine step up from Free, but two things stay behind the Pro wall. First, cloud library sync between Apple and non-Apple devices is a Pro feature, so an iPad plus a Windows laptop will not share a library on Essential. Second, the advanced AI sits on Pro or the AI Pass. If your setup is one device and you want handwriting without a watermark, Essential is enough.

Goodnotes Special Edition price: is the one-time option still worth it?

Yes, for one kind of user: someone who works only on iPad or Mac, does not need sync through Goodnotes Cloud, and dislikes subscriptions on principle. Everyone else ends up wanting the sync, and at that point Pro at $35.99 a year is the honest comparison. Note that the Special Edition "varies by region" according to Goodnotes, so it may not be offered where you are.

What Goodnotes costs against the other note apps people cross-shop

| App | Entry paid price | Yearly cost | Free plan | |---|---|---|---| | Goodnotes | Essential $11.99/yr | $11.99 to $35.99 | Yes (3 files) | | Notability | Lite $11.99/yr, Plus $15.99/yr, Pro $79.99/yr (notability.com/pricing, read November 1, 2026) | $11.99 to $79.99 | Yes (Starter, 5 notes) | | CollaNote | Lifetime Premium $13.90 one-time (US App Store) | $0 after the one-time purchase | Yes | | Evernote | Starter about $99 a year (Evernote shows prices only at checkout; US figure reported October 2026) | about $99 | Yes (50 notes, 1 notebook) | | Noteshik | Pro $3.99/mo or $24.99/yr | $24.99 (Premium $8.99/mo or $54.99/yr) | Yes (60 notes) |

The handwriting apps (Goodnotes, Notability, CollaNote) are cheap at the entry tier and expensive at the top tier. The typed-notes apps split differently: Evernote has moved to roughly $99 a year for its first paid plan, while Noteshik Pro is $24.99 a year with the AI tools included rather than sold as an add-on.

When Goodnotes is the right buy

Pick Goodnotes if you write by hand with a stylus, annotate PDFs for lectures or contracts, and want the paper feel. Essential at $11.99 covers one device. Pro at $35.99 covers a multi-device life. The Special Edition covers the Apple-only, pay-once purist.

When a typed-notes app is the better buy

If your notes are typed, dictated or clipped from the web, you are paying Goodnotes for a handwriting engine you will not use. That is where Noteshik fits:

• Pro $3.99 a month or $24.99 a year; Premium $8.99 a month or $54.99 a year. AI summaries, ask-your-notes and auto-tagging are included on the paid plans, not an extra pass.
• Free plan holds 60 notes so you can test it properly.
• Runs on the web, Windows, macOS, Google Play and Amazon Fire tablets. The Web Clipper installs from noteshik.com today; store listings are on the way.
• Imports Evernote (.enex), Notion, Obsidian, Joplin and Markdown, so a move takes one upload. OneNote import is coming.
• Notes are encrypted at rest (AES-256) and in transit (TLS). Real-time collaboration is coming to Premium.

Related reading

• CollaNote vs Goodnotes: is the free app good enough?
• 7 best free iPad note-taking apps
• Free alternatives to Evernote that stay free