They are looking for the notes they already wrote. We sell software, not a tablet you can buy today, so this page has no reason to talk you into a particular device. Below: what each of the real alternatives is actually good at, and the one problem that follows you to every single one of them.
| Device | Buy it for | Live with |
|---|---|---|
| reMarkable | The writing feel, still the one reviewers measure the others against, and the most disciplined “nothing but a page” software in the category. | Handwriting search sits behind the Connect subscription, $3.99/month as of March 2026, and arrived as a Connect-only beta in software 3.22, September 2025. The longer version is on the Connect page. |
| Boox | An open Android tablet with an e-ink screen. If you want to install your own apps, or write with something other than the maker's own software, this is the one that lets you. It is also the only device gemnotes writes on directly today. | The openness cuts both ways: more settings, more ways to end up distracted, and an Android device on your desk with the account and network questions that come with it. Longer version: reMarkable vs Boox. |
| Supernote | A devoted following for the writing feel and a maker that ships handwriting search without a monthly fee. | Fewer accessories and fewer third-party tools. gemnotes does not read Supernote files yet; it is listed as NOT YET on status, not as coming soon. |
| Kindle Scribe | Battery, price, and the Kindle library you may already own. Amazon has been adding on-device notebook AI, so a lot of people already have a capable device in a drawer. | Amazon's store, on Amazon's terms. gemnotes does not read Scribe files yet either. |
| Viwoods and the newer Android e-ink makers | They ship features fast, bundle the stylus and case, and skip the subscription. If the feature list is what you are shopping for, they win it. | Young software, and features that live inside one maker's app. Nothing carries across to the next device you buy. |
Category facts checked 2 Sep 2026. Prices and firmware features in this category move fast; check the maker's own page before you buy anything.
Buy any device on that list and you inherit its search, which means you also inherit its edge. The notebooks from the tablet before it stay outside, and the ones from the tablet after it will too. People have been posting about this on r/RemarkableTablet since 2018, and the count is in the retrieval guide. The threads keep appearing because the question was never about the tablet.
“the part that always breaks is not the notes. It's remembering what I said I'd do… otherwise the notes just become a graveyard.”
Every maker on the list above will sell you search inside their own app, for their own device. None of them will index the reMarkable you used in 2022 alongside the Boox on your desk today, because a device company has no reason to make your old device useful. That gap is structural, and it is the only reason a small project gets to stand here.
So the honest recommendation is boring: buy the tablet whose writing feel you like and whose software you can live with. Then solve retrieval separately, once, in a place that outlives the hardware.
It depends on which half of reMarkable you are leaving. Leaving the writing feel: almost nothing beats it, and reviewers still measure the category against it. Leaving the subscription: Boox, Supernote and Kindle Scribe all do handwriting search without a monthly fee. Leaving because you cannot find what you wrote: that one follows you to every device on the list, and the four routes out of it are laid out in how to search your handwritten notes.
Not as a device. There is a notebook design and it is not manufactured; no payment is taken. As software it is an alternative to the Connect subscription: search across every notebook and every device you own, running on your own computer.
Live writing: Boox, tested on a Go 10.3. Any e-ink tablet can also write through a surface that runs in the tablet's own browser, with nothing to install. Import: reMarkable .rm v6 files are read directly as strokes. Supernote and Kindle Scribe are not read yet. The full table is on setup.
No, and you cannot buy anything here yet. The desktop app runs on the tablet you already own; there is no signed installer, and download says so plainly rather than collecting an email against a promise.
No. Recognition runs locally and the call goes to 127.0.0.1. Check it yourself with tcpdump, Little Snitch, or your router's log; security lists the four claims and how to verify each one.
Because there is no gemnotes tablet to sell you, and pretending otherwise would be the fastest way to lose the only thing this project has. What is being built is the layer above the hardware, and that layer is worth more the more devices you have owned.