Apps for designers
Note taking apps for desktop and mobile
A real app on the desk and in your pocket.
Most designers capture on a phone and think on a laptop. Grape is a real app on both, with the same library in each and research sessions and critiques landing wherever you are.
Full workspace on desktop: sidebar, editor, chat, canvas and search
Ten second capture on mobile: open, talk or type, done
Keyboard shortcuts on desktop for everything you do often
The same library on every device once sync is on
Desktop for the long work
Writing up, cleaning up and asking bigger questions of everything.
Mobile for the moment it happens
Recording, chat and search are one tap from the note list.
Local on both
Each device keeps its own copy, so a dead connection changes nothing.
Ten second capture on mobile
Open the app, talk or type, and it is already saved when you look up.
Shortcuts for what you repeat
The desktop app has a key for everything you do twice a day.
One library on both
Turn sync on and the desk and the pocket hold the same notes.
01 Outcomes
Three problems, resolved
Not a feature grid. What changes when the sketch and the reasoning live in the same file.
01
The sketch is in one app and the reasoning is in another.
Draw the idea inside the note
An infinite canvas sits in the editor, so a wireframe and the thinking behind it stay together.
02
Six months on, nobody can say why the pattern was chosen.
Explain a decision six months later
Ask why a pattern was chosen and get the note where you argued it out.
03
Research sessions end as a folder of recordings nobody plays back.
Run research without a second tool
Record the session, get the transcript, and pull the quotes into the summary.
04 In use
What that looks like for designers
Three points in a project where the tool changes the work.
Kickoff
Collect the constraints, screenshots and references into one note per problem.
Exploration
Sketch on the canvas, write the tradeoffs underneath and link to related notes.
Critique
Record the feedback session so you are listening instead of typing.
The rest of the app
What Else Grape Does
Every part of the app is built around the same idea: keep what you write, and hand it back when you need it.
07 Questions
Questions Before You Install It
The rest of them live in the help center.
Keep both in the same note.
Drawing canvas, screenshots, research and the reasoning behind a decision in one place, so the rationale survives longer than the file name.