What Evernote offers above all else is simple, clean, and well-organized note-taking outside of any word processor.

You probably won’t be composing a complete novel within Evernote, but for daily note-taking, Evernote sets a high bar. I dropped the attachment into my “Spain” note, and referenced it anytime I needed to add another to-do item.Evernote is a handy note-taking and organizational tool. In my case, I had a very lengthy spreadsheet within Google Docs that was housing all of my hotel, flight, and excursion confirmations for an upcoming trip to Spain. The Google Drive attachment function is great because you can reference a spreadsheet or presentation that can’t be fully created in the free version of Evernote. There’s also the paperclip icon on the top right corner of the note where you can add attachments that might not be on your desktop. For my “post LG Instagram” item on my checklist, I simply dropped the image into the note so I knew exactly which photo I’d be using.

If you’re a visual learner, it’s easy to drop-in diagrams, videos, photos, GIFs, and anything else that is important in order to give yourself the full picture. For files on your computer, Evernote makes it easy with a simple drag-and-drop function. There are two ways to attach files to a note: directly from your computer or from the cloud with Google Drive. If you’re headed back to school, let’s focus on how to get the most out of this app so you can keep your GPA high throughout the year. But the app is pretty intuitive and fairly easy to understand on mobile, too. I’m going to be running through how to use Evernote on a Mac desktop, since that is mainly where I access it. Nonetheless, the free tier of Evernote still gets the job done. But Evernote’s changing prices are one reason The Verge’s Casey Newton gave up on the app completely. I personally feel like the free version will do just fine, as I’ve found 60MB of space to be pretty adequate for notes. If you want to get a little bit more from Evernote, such as more devices to sync across, offline access, or more robust storage features, you can sign up for the Plus Plan that starts at $25 annually. One of the best things about Evernote is that it works pretty much everywhere, including iOS, Android, Mac, Windows, and on the web. I’ve been using the free version since early 2013. That is why Evernote is by far my favorite note-taking app that helps me keep my life in order.

Evernote desktop notebooks organizatin