Nebo on iPhone: your notes, now more accessible than ever

2023-11-14

Nebo is designed for tablets like iPad, which offer an optimal note-taking experience thanks to their larger screens and the precision of pens like Apple Pencil. But we know that you sometimes need to access and update your content when your tablet isn’t available – whether the battery died unexpectedly or you’re on the move and don’t have it to hand.

Our first iPhone app, Nebo Viewer, allowed you to access, search and share your Nebo content – handy, but limited. If you wanted to make edits, you had to revert to your tablet.

Today, we’re thrilled to announce the next step in Nebo’s evolution: Nebo on iPhone. All Nebo’s note-taking power in your pocket!

Adapting Nebo for iPhone: a technical challenge

Bringing Nebo to iPhone wasn’t straightforward, and we faced a range of issues while trying to ensure a high-quality experience.

Screen size

Fitting a user-friendly interface on a smaller screen while maintaining all of Nebo's functionality was no small task. Clear, clean design is central to the Nebo experience, and we knew we would have to adjust our user interface to ensure navigation remained easy and intuitive on iPhone. A similar principle applied to your notes themselves: we would have to make sure that any content created on a larger screen would display legibly on a smaller one, and vice versa.

Pen-free interactions

Nebo is a pen-first note-taking app but iPhone doesn’t support Apple Pencil, so we had to reimagine how users would interact with their content. Editing on iPhone would have to be keyboard-first, with the added possibility of using your finger instead of a pen to perform Nebo’s key editing gestures – like scratching out content to erase it, or using a vertical stroke to add or remove space.

Auto-sync

Ensuring conflict-free content synchronization across devices and platforms was crucial, especially when different devices have varied interaction methods. We actually started work on this a while back, introducing lightning-fast page-level sync with Nebo 5, then rolling out our auto-sync feature a short time later. These updates enabled swifter, more reliable syncing of content across devices and platforms – with auto-sync, you can simply “set and forget”, while Nebo mirrors your changes across all your devices.

Nebo and iPhone: a great fit

Fortunately for us, it wasn’t all challenges. In fact, some of Nebo’s existing features already made it a great candidate for an iPhone version:

Zoom and pan in Notes

The expandable canvas in a Nebo Note is designed for easy navigation, letting you zoom in for a closer look or out to see the bigger picture. You can also pan smoothly around the page – all of which means that the iPhone’s smaller screen size needn’t restrict your creativity.

Effortless PDF reviewing

Nebo lets you import Word docs, PowerPoint decks and PDFs as multi-page PDFs, ready for marking up. You can also zoom and pan in an imported PDF, just like in a Nebo Note – making Nebo the perfect choice for reviewing and annotating files on your iPhone.

Responsive content in Documents

Content created within a Nebo Document is inherently responsive, whether handwritten or typed. This means that it automatically reflows when viewed on a different screen, keeping things readable and orderly even at iPhone proportions.

Generative AI, auto-sync, and editing on the move

The architecture upgrades we introduced with the launch of Nebo 5 lay the groundwork for Nebo on iPhone. Central to this is our new, lightning-fast cloud sync, which makes it far easier to manage multiple versions of your content without causing conflicts.

But it doesn’t end there. Nebo on iPhone brings all of Nebo’s productivity-boosting features to iPhone for the first time, including:

On-the-go content editing

With Nebo on iPhone, you can edit and update your content using your finger or the keyboard. Imagine highlighting important parts of your lecture notes on the way home from school, or recording great ideas the moment you have them rather than waiting until your tablet is available.

Even better, if you’ve enabled auto-sync and signed in to your free MyScript account, your changes will be instantly mirrored across all your devices. Don’t worry, you can still sync manually if you prefer!

Nebo AI beta

Nebo’s new generative-AI features are still in beta, and you can preview them for free on iPhone as well as on your iPad (please note, they’re English-only during the beta phase).

Chat with the AI about your subject of study, get explanations of complex ideas or request an instant text summary of a long passage from your lecture notes. Revising for exams? Generate quizzes from your content, helping you to memorize info faster – and have some fun in the process.

Editing with gestures

Nebo’s intuitive pen gestures can be used to edit and format content without breaking your flow – and they’re still available on iPhone, just using your finger instead of a pen. You can scratch out content to erase it, or draw vertical strokes to add or remove space.

Your notes in your pocket

Nebo on iPhone redefines accessibility, ensuring that your notes are always within arm's reach and ready for editing, even when you’re on the move. Whether your iPad battery died unexpectedly, or you simply want to leave your tablet and travel light, your Nebo library remains at your fingertips – literally.

Even better, if you’ve already purchased access to the full version of Nebo on iPad, you can download and enjoy the full app on iPhone and Mac without paying again – simply use the App Store’s “Restore Purchases” feature to unlock everything.

Download Nebo on iPhone today and let us know your thoughts. As always, your feedback will play a vital role in shaping the future of digital note-taking.

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