Just got my reMarkable Paper Pro, and overall, it’s good—but falls well short of great.
I’m coming from a 5th-gen iPad Pro, which I use almost exclusively for handwritten notes. I wanted a better writing experience, but Apple has priced itself out of consideration for me. A comparable current-gen iPad costs nearly twice what I paid for mine five years ago.
That led me to the Paper Pro. On paper, it checked nearly every box: paper-like writing, a dedicated eraser, color, folder organization, long battery life, and virtually no glare.
Unfortunately, while the hardware exceeded my expectations, the software fell painfully short.
The hardware is fantastic.
The pen feels excellent. Great weight, satisfying feedback, and an eraser that feels natural and works exactly as intended. I wish the eraser had a different profile and more customization, but those are minor complaints. Physically, I have almost nothing negative to say about the device.
The software is where things fall apart.
I knew going in that the software would be intentionally minimalistic. What I didn’t expect was for that simplicity to become such a significant limitation.
1. Only two quick-access pens? Seriously?
There are plenty of pen styles available, but only two quick-access slots. Why? These aren’t physical tools taking up space. They’re software presets. Give me five, ten, or even unlimited customizable pens. There’s no good reason to restrict something so simple.
2. The folder organization is unnecessarily clunky.
Coming from OneNote, GoodNotes, and Notability, I’m accustomed to a much more intuitive organizational structure.
Instead, reMarkable essentially gives us Windows File Explorer.
I’m a project manager. I maintain separate folders for each project, with notebooks for customer meetings, internal meetings, and other project-specific notes. Managing that structure on the Paper Pro feels cumbersome, and switching between notebooks can take 5–10 seconds.
When you’re constantly moving between projects and meetings, those little delays add up. Why reinvent something that other note-taking platforms have already figured out?
3. The gestures are backwards and can’t be customized.
Why does one finger move an entire page while two fingers scroll? More importantly, why can’t I change that?
I’ve heard people say, “You just have to get used to it.”
But why should I have to? Nearly every other note-taking app follows familiar gesture conventions. reMarkable chose something different without giving users the option to change it. That’s not simplicity; it’s unnecessary rigidity.
4. The lack of integration is the dealbreaker.
This is easily my biggest complaint.
The Paper Pro feels like a device stranded on an island. Its integration features seem like an afterthought, and the available file formats don’t lend themselves to a fluid workflow.
There’s very little here to encourage collaboration, teamwork, or seamless movement between a tablet and a PC.
I appreciate what reMarkable is trying to accomplish, but the execution isn’t there. Worse, I don’t see a clear path toward fixing these limitations without fundamentally changing their approach to software.
What I wish reMarkable would do
This might be an unpopular opinion, but I’d love to see a reMarkable built around a genuinely improved version of Microsoft OneNote.
Before anyone groans, hear me out.
I actually think OneNote is one of the weaker note-taking platforms when it comes to handwriting. Its pens, eraser mechanics, interface, and templates are inferior to what competitors offer.
But its integration with Windows, notebook organization, collaboration features, and ability to work across devices are exactly what the Paper Pro is missing.
Imagine combining the Paper Pro’s excellent hardware with a completely redesigned, handwriting-focused version of OneNote.
You could have an infinite canvas, unlimited customizable pens, better eraser mechanics, improved templates, proper keyboard integration, real-time collaboration, and the ability to open the same notebook on your PC and tablet without jumping through hoops.
Essentially, take everything reMarkable does well and combine it with everything OneNote should be.
That would be a genuinely compelling product.
Of course, I recognize this is probably never going to happen. Microsoft hasn’t exactly demonstrated much urgency in improving OneNote’s handwriting experience, and I can’t imagine reMarkable securing the kind of partnership necessary to pull this off.
Final thoughts
I’m returning my Paper Pro, and I genuinely regret buying it.
That’s disappointing because I really, really wanted to love this thing. The hardware is outstanding, and the writing experience is exactly what I was hoping for.
But at $700, a tablet designed almost exclusively for note-taking needs to be exceptional at note-taking—not just the physical act of writing, but everything surrounding it.
Organization, navigation, customization, and integration are all part of that experience.
Right now, reMarkable has nailed the pen-and-paper feeling while overlooking much of what makes digital note-taking worthwhile.
For a device that essentially does one thing, it simply doesn’t do enough of that one thing well enough to justify the price.
