A smart pen such as xNote, the Moleskine Smart Pen or the Neo smartpen records every stroke as you write, but it needs its own paper with an almost invisible dot pattern and costs about $130 to $280. Axsuro needs no special pen or paper: you photograph the finished page, and Axsuro reads every line and turns it into tasks, events and documents. If you want live capture stroke by stroke, a smart pen is the better fit; if you want to keep your own notebook, a photo is.
A smart pen writes with real ink. A small camera near the tip reads a pattern of tiny dots printed on the paper, so the pen knows which page it is on and where, and sends every stroke to an app over Bluetooth. On ordinary paper it writes like any pen, and nothing is recorded.
Two things follow from that: the page is digital at once, with no photo. And you are tied to the maker's paper, meaning its notebooks or pages you print yourself with the pattern.
All details from the makers' websites and app store listings, checked on 6 November 2026. Prices in US dollars from the makers' US shops; they may differ elsewhere.
The difference is the moment of capture. The smart pen captures while you write. Axsuro captures afterwards, from a photo of the finished page. What happens after capture overlaps in places: xNote also turns notes into tasks and events.
| Smart pen (xNote, Moleskine, Neo) | Axsuro | |
|---|---|---|
| What you buy | a pen with a battery, about $129 to $279 | nothing, just the app |
| Paper | only the maker's dot-pattern paper, or pages you print yourself | any paper, including old notebooks, whiteboards and PDFs |
| Pen | only the smart pen, with refills | any pen |
| Capture | live, stroke by stroke, no photo | a photo of the page, several in a row |
| Charging and pairing | charge the pen and pair it over Bluetooth | not needed |
| After writing | text, search, export; with xNote also tasks, events and AI chat | every line read and sorted: tasks, events, ideas, documents, sketches, flashcards |
| Devices | apps for iPhone, iPad and Android, web too for xNote and Neo | web app in the browser, iPhone and Android app |
| Running costs | app free, subscriptions optional; the maker's paper | Free with 60 pages a month, Plus €5.99, Pro €11.99 a month |
You write in your notebook as always, with the pen you like. At the end you photograph the page with the Axsuro iPhone and Android app, or upload the photo in the browser. Axsuro reads every line word for word, in 12 languages. A word at the start of a line says what it becomes:
todo: Send quote to Mr Novak Wed becomes a task due on Wednesday.cal: 20 Nov 10:00 Annual review becomes an event in Google Calendar or Outlook.doc: Summer party plan turns the text below into a typed document.Tasks and events wait for "Confirm" and then sync both ways with Google Tasks, Microsoft To Do and Todoist. Axsuro cuts out sketches and makes them editable, formulas become LaTeX, and tables can be copied into Excel. You can bring in whole old notebooks at once, even ones written long before you used Axsuro. A smart pen can't do that: it knows nothing about what was written without it. More under how it works.
You can also use both: to Axsuro, a page from a smart notebook is a page like any other. Every new account starts with 14 days of Pro without a card, followed by a free plan. Everything else is on the pricing page.
No. Axsuro reads photos of paper. Any pen and any paper work, a whiteboard too.
It writes there like a normal pen but records nothing. It only records on paper with the maker's dot pattern or on pages you print yourself with that pattern.
Checked on 6 November 2026 in the makers' US shops: XNote Write $199 with a notebook, the Moleskine Smart Writing Set $279, the Neo smartpen M1+ $129. Notebooks with the dot pattern come on top.
Yes. To Axsuro, a photo of such a page is a photo like any other. If the writing is clearly visible, Axsuro reads it.
It captures live while you write and knows the order of the strokes. Axsuro needs a photo of the finished page.
As a web app in the browser and as an app for iPhone and Android.
Updated
Start with 14 days of Pro, no card needed — and turn full notebooks into something you can act on.
