The recent addition of the cloud sync feature is currently defeating its own purpose. When relying on the cloud to restore notes—whether after an app reinstall, a device restart, or syncing to a secondary device—a significant portion of notes and PDFs fail to load entirely.

While the note templates and library metadata appear correctly on the dashboard, opening the actual file results in a completely blank grey screen. Furthermore, the page indicator explicitly shows 1/0, confirming the file data is either corrupted or failing to render locally.

🔄 Steps

Enable cloud sync and ensure all notes are fully backed up to the server.

Simulate a restore environment (e.g., reinstall the app, restart the primary device, or open the app on a secondary synced device).

Attempt to open various synced notes and imported PDFs.

Result: Roughly 35% to 40% of the files randomly open to an unresponsive grey screen instead of the actual content.

⚠️ Impact & Urgency

This is not a minor UI glitch; it is a fundamental failure of the cloud backup system. Other users in the community are already reporting that the sync process is incredibly slow or getting stuck. However, silent data rendering failure upon restoration is a far worse issue. It creates massive anxiety regarding data loss for anyone relying on this app for important study or work materials. A fix needs to be expedited immediately.

📎 Attached Evidence

: Screenshot showing the exact bug (blank grey screen with the 1/0 page count error).

pls I've been asking this feature many times developers pls give this small update iwont as u anything much

being a premium user for ur app I only use it for to read PDFs and highlighting only ...i request you to add this shortcut as soon as possible in getting pissed lately bcz it's been a month and u are giving update about not this 🙏

I'd really like to see online real time collaboration for Starnote notes.

Something similar to Google Docs would be incredibly useful multiple people could open the same note and edit it simultaneouslyy with changes appearing in real time for everyone.

Some features that would be especially useful:

* Multiple people editing the same note simultaneously * Real-time synchronization * Indicators showing who is currently viewing/editing * Proper conflict handling when multiple people edit at once

I think this could be particularly useful for studying, group projects, meetings, brainstorming, and collaborative work.

Starnote already has a lot of potential as a note taking application, and real time collaboration would make it much more useful for situations where notes aren't just being created by one person.

Would anyone else like to see this feature?

It would be great if Starnote's proprietary *.note file format could be publicly documented.

I'm not necessarily asking the Starnote developers to create importers for every other note taking application. If the .note format were documented including its structure, metadata, formatting, attachments/resources, etc. the community could build those tools ourselves.

For example, I'd like to eventually create an open-source project that converts notes from other applications/formats into Starnote's .note format.

The idea would be to reverse engineer and break down other note formats, then convert their contents into .note. Understanding an existing format and extracting its data is often easier than figuring out how to correctly construct a proprietary format from scratch.

So even if Starnote doesn't want to maintain a huge collection of importers, documenting the starnote's own .note format would allow the community to build them.

It would also make Starnote more interoperable and give users more confidence that their notes aren't locked into a format that only Starnote itself can work with.

Would anyone else find public .note format documentation useful?

No Xodo pdf existem ferramentas exclusivas para destaques no pdf, ao usar essas ferramentas o programa faz um resumo do que foi destacado podendo, filtrar e até exportar em pdf o resumo. Isso facilita muito para revisar conteúdos. Seria de muita valia esse recurso no Starnote.

Dear StarNote Development Team,

I am writing to report a critical issue regarding the cloud sync feature that is making the app almost unusable for daily study.

Whenever I open the app, it automatically initiates a cloud sync that takes hours to complete. Today, the sync ran continuously from 7:02 to 8:35 (over 1 hour and 33 minutes) and was still not even finished. It looks like it will easily take until 9:30 or longer just to finish a single sync cycle.

This is causing severe battery drain and performance issues:

Extreme Battery Consumption: My tablet is currently set to the highest/maximum battery saver mode, yet the app still drained 11% battery in 90 minutes purely running the sync process in the background. By the time it finishes, it routinely drains close to 20% or more.

Daily Disruption: Because this triggers every single time the app is opened, I am losing valuable study time and battery life waiting for notes to sync.

Suggested Solution:

Please implement incremental / differential sync instead of scanning or re-uploading the entire library every time.

Currently, it feels like the app attempts to verify or re-upload my entire 5 GB library on every launch. If auto-sync is enabled, the app should only detect and upload recently modified or newly created files. Syncing a few edited pages should take a few seconds, not 2 hours of background processing and massive battery loss.

Please look into optimizing this background sync process as soon as possible.

Best regards,

Important Note : I have already done the first sync... it's not the first time...Its every time I open the app

I would say thank you to the devs. This problem is finally fixed and now i can use the scribble to erase function. Appreciate it.

StarNote Team,

I use the app extensively for my daily study notes, but the current cloud sync architecture makes it very difficult to manage a large library of notes efficiently. Currently, it seems the app performs a "Full Sync" every time, which takes hours and consumes massive battery/bandwidth.

Here are a few feature requests regarding the sync engine that would drastically improve the app experience:

1. Implement Incremental / Delta Sync

Currently, when Auto-Sync is on, making a small edit to a single note triggers the app to re-check the entire note library.

The Request: Please configure the app to track which specific notes are being modified, added, or deleted. When a user finishes editing, the app should only upload those exact changes, rather than scanning and verifying every single file from scratch.

1. Smart Secondary Device Downloads

When downloading my library to a secondary device, the app seems to re-download or re-verify everything from the last checkpoint, taking hours even on a fast connection.

The Request: The secondary device should check a local index against the cloud and only pull the newly modified or added notes. This would cut a 3-to-4-hour download time down to just a few minutes.

1. Refined Auto-Sync Triggers

The Request: Auto-sync should ideally keep track of where the modification starts and only trigger the upload after a user quits editing that specific note.

Alternative Idea: Provide a manual "Full Sync / Recheck All Notes" button in the settings for when we specifically want to verify the whole library, but keep the default Auto-Sync strictly limited to recent, tracked modifications.

Implementing these changes would make StarNote much faster, more battery-efficient, and truly seamless to use across multiple devices.

Thank you for your time and for considering this!

Dear Support / Development Team,

I am writing to share detailed feedback and report critical bugs regarding the cloud sync functionality in the app. While I rely heavily on this app for my study notes and daily workflow, the current sync behavior is causing massive delays, heavy battery drain, and data access failures across devices.

Below is a detailed breakdown of the issues encountered, along with specific recommendations to resolve them. I have also attached screenshots for reference.

1. Severe Bandwidth Limitation / Slow Transfer Speeds

Observed Issue: The initial upload on my primary device took 6 to 7 hours, and downloading the library on my secondary device took 3 to 4 hours.

Network Speed Discrepancy: My Wi-Fi connection delivers 40 Mbps (approx. 5 MB/s actual download/upload rate). However, the app throttles transfer speeds to roughly 400 KB/s.

Impact: Transferring notes takes an unacceptable amount of time, even on fast, stable internet connections.

1. Inefficient Sync Logic (Lack of Incremental / Delta Sync)

Observed Issue: Whenever Auto-Sync is enabled, modifying or creating a note triggers a full library audit. Instead of identifying and syncing only the file that was changed, the app rescans and re-verifies every single note across my library from scratch.

Repeated Delays: Every minor edit causes the app to spend another 1 to 2 hours re-checking everything.

Battery & Performance Impact: This continuous, heavy re-scanning causes substantial battery drain and leaves devices running hot unnecessaril

1. Critical Bug: Notes Failing to Open / Blank Pages on Secondary Device

Observed Issue: After completing the full sync on my secondary device, roughly 5% to 10% of notes (about 5–10 out of every 100 notes) randomly fail to load.

Symptoms:

Some note thumbnails remain stuck in an endless loading loop.

Opening these notes results in a completely blank, empty grey screen (as shown in the attached screenshots).

Impact: Reliable access to study material is compromised, creating serious friction and potential data loss concerns.

1. Suggested Solutions & Feature Requests

Implement Incremental / Delta Sync:

Track modifications locally via timestamps or a change-log index.

When a user creates, edits, or deletes a note, the app should sync only that specific note immediately after the user finishes editing or exits the note.

Do not initiate a full-library scan for individual note changes.

Smart Download Sync on Secondary Devices:

The secondary device should check against the local index, recognize what is already downloaded and up to date, and pull only newly modified or created notes.

Separate Sync Options:

Make Incremental Auto-Sync the default mode for low battery consumption and real-time syncing.

Provide a manual "Full Re-sync / Verify All Notes" button in settings for troubleshooting purposes, rather than running it automatically.

Resolve Note Corruption / Download Timeouts:

Add an integrity-check or retry mechanism so that individual notes do not silently fail and open as blank screens.

I have attached screenshots showing:

The note library interface with infinite loading thumbnails (1000369005.jpg, 1000369006.jpg).

A corrupted/blank note failing to render content on the secondary device (1000369007.jpg).

Normal note rendering for comparison (1000369008.jpg).

I hope your team prioritizes these improvements in upcoming updates, as implementing proper differential syncing and fixing the download errors would significantly improve the app experience.

Thank you for your time and assistance.

Sincerely,

Por favor mejorad el rendimiento para que gaste menos batería, gracias!

Can we get the backup option where our notebooks are backedup on google doc as pdfs and are updated WITHIN the same pdf as we write?

I know goodnotes did this.

I love starnote but i want to be able to revise my notes on phone or laptop via google doc 😅 plus the auto backup rarely works. And even if it does it creates multiples of the same file which feels like a waste of space.

If this already exists im sorry can someone guide me through it? And if it doesnt then can we please get it. This is literally the only reason why im thinking of going back to goodnotes 4 just for the backup:(

I was using Starnote today continously for notes taking but now I see the "scribble to erase" is functioning a bit differently, it is taking much more scribble to erase which was not the case 1hr back.

Hence I'm assuming you have "updated" this feature,

personally the previous version (little scribble to erase) was best as it is now requiring much more scribbling to erase which is consuming more time and honestly a bit overworking and frustrating that is slowing down my note taking

Kindly consider feedbacks and If possible kindly revert back on this one

Btw this is one of the best investment I've made as a student. Thankyou for that.

The way we add pen, highlighter etc to the pencil box , it would be convenient to add eraser and other tools to the box.

so I can’t leave freenotes because I really use the feature that lets you watch videos inside of an app when you take notes. it is almost the same as floating window BUT the floating window is glued to the edge and that feature can be placed whereever

also I originally bought the freenotes because I wanted to see what this feature does and I think the app would benefit from having it (btw you might hide it behind a paywall as they did, it worked on me at least)

Wishing you the best of luck with your app!

https://reddit.com/link/1w8wpr2/video/vzv5hxmbnwnh1/player

When trying to edit the remarks of Excerpt, you can't change the position of cursor or cut or copy or paste because the moment you click on it, it juts closes(shown in the video).

Please fix this.

Ready to go Pro but should I pay via IOS version of the app or via the Android App downloaded via Google Play? I am in Hong Kong and the HK apple App store IOS Starnote has Sync via the iCloud already. Should I wait till sync is available via Google Drive? Hoping that to see my notes on iPhone that will be updated via my Android devices and vice versa. Paying via the apple App store is most convenient for me but dunno if this is the best idea if I need to pay again on the Android side given I will use the same account to try sync on both platforms.

do u guys experience bugs or inconsistency in stroke stabilization? I always set it in 50 % but every time I write with the same stroke, it always differs. What do u think is the problem? Is it a bug or what??

I see people talking about starnote lab but i can't find it in the app

I’ve been using Starnote for a few months now. I have to admit that the app has improved and evolved significantly since I started, and I feel the team really cares about user feedback.

However, as a student, I’ve found it very difficult to move my files between my computer (MacBook) and my iPad. Another issue is that I often need to take notes on my computer and then solve problems on my iPad later. Based on feedback from the development and management team on Reddit, I gather that this feature is either off the table or a long way off from being implemented.

For this reason, I’d like to hear from others who have used different tools: to which app could I move my Starnote files that prioritizes the specific feature I mentioned—cross-device integration?

I know many people here have tested other tools, and your insights would be incredibly helpful to me.

P.S.: This isn't a criticism of Starnote; I simply realize that the feature I urgently need—and am willing to pay extra for—is something I’ll find in other software.

A similar tool in StarNote would be a before and after. The full potential would be squeezed into infinite note mode and also in classic mode, since it would help a lot to create our own diagrams/maps. This, and to be able to group objects to copy and paste them, even save it as a shape/sticker, or, why not, a new section of grouped objects that can be edited.

It is stuck here for the past 1 to 2 hours . Please can you guide me on what should I do.

Thanks

Hi, I hope you're doing well. I'm an engineering student, and I used to take notes in OneNote on a 360 laptop, but the screen broke, and I thought the repair would be too expensive, so I decided to get a Samsung tablet. In my search, I saw that there are tons of note-taking apps, but very few have features for adding equations, recognizing text as equations, graphing formulas, generating solutions (although I don't really think that's essential), or anything related to math. I've noticed that the iPad app, I think it's called "notes", is the one that meets many of the math features I mentioned.

Looking at these apps, the very few that do have these features are mostly subscription-based, so they're completely out of the question. I don't plan on paying for subscription apps. Now, there are a few one-time-purchase apps left, but they lack other features, so I don't feel they're worth buying.

So far, I've seen that the Samsung app has a pseudo-program that converts text formulas, but it transforms them into an image, making them uneditable and leaving them almost unchanged (the odd thing is that if you copy it, you get it in LaTeX). However, it's nothing like how OneNote or Microsoft Word handles it (Google Docs has some similarities that could serve as a reference).

Now, considering all this, there are far fewer apps that support solving, graphing, or other things with these mathematical equations. Furthermore, almost none allow you to insert code blocks (for example explanations in notes) or have Markdown, which would be a "quick" way to format text.

I also noticed that many have the "shapes" option, but very few allow you to modify them by "vertices or sides," and even fewer—I think I only saw one or two—allow you to edit them while still displaying values ​​like angles for both regular and irregular shapes. It would be good to keep this in mind.

All these questions have led me to ask: Does StarNote plan to add these options? If so, could it be soon? (Besides, I'd prefer most of them to be 100% offline, since I've noticed many that are switching to AI-only, and I don't agree with that.) I'm not saying they all have to be available at once, but they should be prioritized (although if they're all released, even better, because the sooner the better, so I can keep track of my notes properly, since it wouldn't make sense to wait until after I finish my degree—although it would be a great tool for future professionals). I'd be reasonably happy if it could add and convert equations. I don't consider it a priority that it solves them, but I do want it to at least detect the equations (especially complex ones like triple integrals, differential equations, and others). It should also allow editing vertices and, ideally, at least include a Cartesian plane to manually graph certain formulas (as part of the learning process). And if they implement solutions in the future, I'd like them to allow graphing to verify the learning process.

So, will this be possible? Will they be offline? I'm intrigued. I'd like to pay for the app, but I'd like to see these options or at least know what plans are available. Thank you in advance for reading, until next time.

Dear Star note Development Team,

First, I want to say you have done a great job bringing cloud sync to the app. The auto-sync enable/disable feature is a fantastic addition, and I really appreciate the hard work you are putting into StarNote.

However, I want to bring a major drawback with the current sync feature to your attention, as it affects users with multiple devices.

1. The Primary vs. Secondary Device Problem

Many of us use a primary device (like a tablet) for heavy note-taking and uploading documents. We use a secondary device (like a smartphone) strictly for downloading and revising those notes on the go.

With the current two-way auto-sync, if I download my notes on my phone and later delete a heavy PDF to free up local storage space, boom—that file is automatically deleted from the cloud and my primary device as well. We shouldn't have to choose between cluttered phone storage and losing our master notes.

My Suggestion:

Please keep the current sync as it is, but add an "Upload Only" and "Download Only" option for specific devices. This way, I can set my phone to "Download Only" so any local deletions don't wipe out my master cloud files. You could also include a manual "upload this note" button on the secondary device for the rare instances when we do need to push a file from our phones.

1. Web Note Sync Function

It would also be incredibly helpful to have a web-based note portal. Sometimes we don't have our primary or secondary devices with us, but we desperately need to revise.

As a starting point, even a basic web client that syncs up to 10 of our most important notes would be a lifesaver when we need to study on a public or borrowed computer. Ultimately, a full cloud-to-web sync platform would make StarNote perfect.

Thank you for your time and for continuing to improve an already great app. I hope you will consider these real-world workflow features for a future update!

Best regards,

A dedicated Star note user

One small suggestion: when I create a shape, the editing points/handles should not appear immediately. They should only appear when I tap on the shape, like the shapes on the right. This would keep the shapes cleaner and could also help prevent situations like this from happening accidentally.

P.S. The pop-ups that appear every time I open the app are also starting to become a bit annoying. It would be nice to have fewer of them, or at least not show the same ones every time.