Apple Apps are rubbish – Happily Imperfect

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Apple Apps are rubbish

“Patience, my young Padawan” is not actually a line used in any Star Wars movie.

It is, however, something that seems to be in dwindling supply online. The prevailing culture is one of everything now. The technology train is leaving for productivity town, so hop aboard for the next update, the next feature, the next boost, the next small miracle that will make us better, faster, calmer, more organised and whole.

It is, of course, big tech to blame for this impatience and —with every keynote, every release note, every biggest update ever— we are pushed further along the tracks towards a version of the latest thing that we must have so that finally everything will click.

While I am a fan of Apple products, I know that Apple is no different. If you watch most Apple keynotes you’ll see the same broad themes return again and again as they tout better integrations, smoother workflows, more intelligence, and then scatter a few new features in for good measure. Slowly the default Apple apps improve because, simply, they must.

Apple continues to maintain their default software suite apps because they matter, not just because they sit on top of the operating system, but because they help sell the whole ecosystem. The better Notes, Reminders, Calendar, Mail, Photos, Journal, and the rest become, the more useful your iPhone, iPad, Mac, and Apple Watch become together. That, in turn, keeps you in Apple’s world. Locked in.

All of those new features seem appealing and also help drive the hardware cycle; Ohhhh you want Apple Intelligence? Well, you’ll need a new iPhone for that.

Yes, I’m still using an iPhone 14 Pro, which does not get the newer Siri AI features and that alone has me pondering an upgrade later this year. I resent this manipulation but not enough to stop pondering the idea.

By and large, Apple’s default apps are good enough for the vast majority of users. Most people do not need the most powerful notes app, the most configurable email client, the most obsessive task manager, or the most advanced journaling app. They need something that opens quickly, syncs reliably, looks familiar, and does the job without asking them to learn a whole new system.

There is another group of users though —I fully admit I fall into this category— who look at Apple’s apps and sigh. They are too simple and are too slow to improve, Apple seem too cautious and too unwilling to give us the buttons and settings and workflows we know are possible. Why can’t they just add a section of Advanced features for crying out loud!

We know it’s possible because we’ve seen other apps do the same jobs better. With more options. More flexibility. More power. More care, sometimes.

Let’s get specific.

Apple Journal is rubbish

Apple Journal is one of Apple’s newest apps. It arrived in December 2023, and as a long-term journaliserer, or whatever the word is, I was intrigued.

My first impression was that it was simple. Very simple. Suspiciously simple. The sort of simple that makes you tap around for a while because you assume you must be missing something. I was not.

Compared with more established journaling apps, Apple Journal felt basic. Day One was the app I saw mentioned most often in comparison, and as it was also the one I had used myself for years I will admit my own bias. Day One has been good enough for my uses for a long time, and although I occasionally looked at alternatives, I always seem to go back to it.

So when Apple launched Journal, to say I was underwhelmed at first is an understatement.

No proper import feature. No Mac app. No iPad app at launch. Not much in the way of organisation. Not much depth. Not much to tempt someone with years of entries, photos, locations, tags, and habits already sitting somewhere else.

I saw someone online (reddit maybe?) ask why Apple didn’t just base Journal on their Notes, which already has enough features to keep most people happy.

It’s a good question. Why didn’t they?

Apple Journal is Apple Notes

Not literally, obviously. What I mean is that Apple Journal feels like the early version of an Apple app that may become very good later. Apple Notes languished for years as a fairly basic, forgettable app. Then, slowly, it improved. It gained formatting, folders, tags, scanning, collaboration, locked notes, enough features that it is now a genuinely decent app.

I switched away from Evernote, after brief dalliances with SimpleNote, Bear, and others, and have been a happy Apple Notes user for a several years now.

Is Apple Notes the best notes app in the world? No.

Does it need to be? Also no.

And that, I think, is the point that is easy to miss. Apple’s default apps are rarely trying to be the best possible version right out of the box. They are not trying to compete feature-for-feature with their immediate competitors.

Rather, Apple apps are built to be good enough to be the default version. They...