ReMarkable 2 Review: 2024 Update
- Jul 7, 2024
- 9 min read
Updated: Jul 19, 2024
Whenever I went somewhere with my reMarkable 2, friends, colleagues and family members always asked me what it is, how much it was and if it's any good. I therefore wrote a fairly lengthy reMarkable 2 review in 2021 in answer to these questions, which I updated a year after owning the device. This is now my third reMarkable 2 review, which is up to date as at July 2024.
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Declaration of interest: I am not associated with reMarkable in any way and am not being paid, nor offered any form or inducement to write this review. reMarkable do periodically send referral codes to existing customers, which I may share on this site when they are made available to me, but they have no influence or relationship whatsoever to my reviews.
Connect Subscription Update
Since my last update in May 2022, reMarkable have changed their pricing structure and the Connect subscription is now a flat £2.99 per month, or £29 if paid annually; much cheaper than the £3.99 tier 1 or £5.99 tier 2 monthly subscription options at the time of my previous review.
At £379 with the basic Marker stylus, or £419 with the Marker Plus, the device and Marker Plus are now a total of £79 cheaper than the £498 I paid for the tablet and Marker Plus in March 2021 . As an early adopter, however, I didn't have to pay for the Connect Subscription, which would otherwise by now have set me back a further £87, even based on the new, reduced flat rate.
For comparison, two years ago, when the subscription was more costly, the tablet was retailing for £299, but this didn't include a stylus (currently £79 for the Marker and £119 for the Marker Plus when purchased independently), or the Connect subscription, so the overall cost of the device and accessories hasn't changed much (£1 cheaper to be precise), but the Connect subscription has come down by £18.88-£42.88 per year, depending on whether you chose the basic or full option.
The new Connect subscription now includes a one-year trial period (which is otherwise limited to 100 days), the 3-year "protection plan" (which is still essentially only an extended warranty because, despite the name, it doesn't cover loss or accidental damage), as well as unlimited cloud storage backup for all your files and access to the mobile and desktop apps.
All other reMarkable features including handwriting recognition, Google Drive, Dropbox and Onedrive integrations do now appear (at the time of writing) to be available without subscription, so you only have to subscribe for cloud storage, a longer trial period, the 3-year warranty and mobile and desktop apps; in my view making it much more palatable and better value for money.
Paying for cloud storage these days is fair enough and you could argue that you don't need it if you can export your notes to your own cloud storage provider. It is however worth remembering that you can only save your notes as PDF, PNG or SVG files, or convert them to text and send them to yourself by email so, although you wouldn't lose them altogether (as long as you remember to export them regularly!), you wouldn't be able to continue to view, access or edit them in the same way on your device if you did lose or damage it. As someone who has dropped one reMarkable on its top edge, causing the power button to become irretrievably embedded (quite a common issue according to Reddit!) and accidentally trodden on another (thankfully both covered by my own gadget insurance, as neither of these incidents would have been covered by their "Protection Plan"), I personally find it invaluable to be able to just login on a new tablet and seamlessly pick up my notes and files exactly where I left off. So, while I still don't agree with charging for the extended warranty, £29 per year even just for unlimited cloud storage doesn't seem quite so bad.
Software
Despite my fears that the manufacturer might not continue to release regular software improvements 3 years after my purchase, I am pleased to say it has had some nice updates. About a year ago they introduced the option to add new pages to notebooks, instead of only having one, long vertically scrolled page and I find this really useful. I can now use one notebook per topic and start a new page for each meeting, instead of having to have a folder per topic and a separate notebook for each meeting, making my notes much easier to organise and view.
The device UI has also recently had a bit of a makeover, providing a battery indicator in the top right-hand corner (instead of bottom left), which expands when tapped to show the % battery remaining, as well as shortcuts for WiFi settings, aeroplane mode and screen share, which you previously had to go into the settings menu to access.
Features
Screen Share
I still haven't had cause to use the screen share feature in anger but, last time I tried, I still couldn't get it to connect to my desktop app. Given that I use the notebook to take handwritten notes while I'm screen sharing on my laptop, specifically so I don't have to share my notes or constantly move windows around, I haven't found this to be a problem and I wouldn't say that it's marketed as one of the key features or selling points of the device.
Copy & Paste
Selecting and erasing text feels a little more accurate after some of the software updates, but the tails of 'y' and 'g' do sometimes still get left behind. It does however remain one of my favourite and most used features on the device and something I would sorely miss if I went back to writing on physical paper.
Handwriting Recognition
After initially being impressed at the handwriting recognition capability, in comparison with the Rocketbook, I did become disappointed with it over time, to the point at which I stopped using it, because I was primarily using it to transcribe meeting notes, which contained a lot of acronyms, shorthand and jargon not easily recognised as words that were often misinterpreted. I also tended to annotate my notes with arrows, callouts and boxes, or write things in tables or column format, none of which obviously translate well to paragraphs of text.
When I instead used it to convert another review that I had written by hand late one night because I wanted to write it while the product was still fresh in my mind, but hadn't wanted to get my laptop out, I was however very pleasantly surprised with the results. I did need to make some minor spelling and formatting corrections after emailing to myself the next day but it was otherwise very easy to edit my 1 am musings and turn them into a hopefully coherent review! Having just tested it, it does also now seem to cope much better with my weird ampersand, bullet points and boxes. I will definitely be using this feature more in future.
Hardware
In terms of hardware, the lack of back-light continues to be a pain point, especially in the recent weather which has varied from bright sunshine one minute to very dark and overcast the next. It's not a problem when using my laptop, monitor or mobile, all of which have nice backlit screens, but I do object to having to get up and turn the light on just to be able to see my reMarkable.
In my opinion, the location of the power button is also something of a design flaw, as it evidently leaves it vulnerable to damage and I do find I sometimes accidentally attempt to power off the device if I've positioned it against the edge of my laptop while using an external keyboard and inadvertently butted it up against the laptop for more than a few seconds (see photograph below). This problem is exacerbated by what I imagine to be a software glitch, where the "Do you want to turn off your reMarkable?" confirmation screen becomes unresponsive if you don't confirm or cancel straightaway, presumably because the display has timed out, but there is no option to return to the home screen or enter your PIN. This leaves you with no option but to actually reboot the device by holding down the power button for even longer!
When I sent this feedback to reMarkable customer support, I got what seemed like an automated response, telling me how to restart the device, which obviously wasn't the solution to my problem because I specifically said I didn't want to have to reboot the tablet in this scenario. They then asked me to record a video demonstrating the problem and complete a 10-step process to upload and send it to them via WeTransfer, which I was not prepared to do. Unfortunately, I've observed that reMarkable are not alone in this customer service trend, which I can only assume is down to the increasing use of "Artificial Intelligence" to automate responses based on key words or phrases in the complaint, combined with Gen Z requiring everything in Tik-Tok video format because they don't have the attention span to read the steps to reproduce a defect!
I still love the convenience of the Marker Plus and haven't had any further issues changing the nib. I have been pleasantly surprised to find they can last up to 3 months, even with regular almost daily use. The quality of writing does start to deteriorate when the nib begins to wear down but I find I can continue to use it for note taking for a few more weeks without being sufficiently bothered by it to cause me to change the nib. If using the stylus for drawing, or more precise work, it may not be as satisfactory and you might find you want to replace them as often as once a month.
I have seen cheaper styluses (without the eraser) online that do work with the reMarkable 2, such as this one, which was under £50 at the time of writing, but this still feels like false economy relative to the overall cost of the device, when the purpose of buying such a luxury gadget is to make note taking completely effortless. It is useful to have as a backup though, just in case you do break or lose the original stylus, or get caught without your spare nibs to hand.
One piece of hardware I am yet to try is the folio keyboard, which I just haven't felt the need to buy. I don't tend to mix writing and typing notes and think I would find typing on the small keyboard and screen with its lack of back-light quite frustrating. Please let me know in the comments if you have tried this piece of kit and if you think it's worth the £179 price tag at the time of writing.
ReMarkable 2 Review: Conclusion
Just over three years on, the reMarkable is still an integral part of my daily workflow. So much so that, when I did accidentally damage it and had to send it away to claim on my gadget insurance, knowing it would take at least a week for them to repair or replace it, I was compelled to buy a new one to bridge the gap, which I later gave to my Husband!
My faith in reMarkable as a retailer has been restored, both by their willingness to rethink the subscription fee structure and the frequency of pretty well bug-free (touch wood!) software updates, which I hope will continue for at least another 2-5 years.
I have seen a few reviews complaining about the customer service from the support team and based on my own recent experience, I have to say I'm inclined to agree. When I did have a problem with my Marker Plus two years ago though, they were very good and replaced it immediately, without having to return the old one, even though it was outside the then 1-year warranty (although I do believe it was likely to have a been a known defect).
The device and accessories remain expensive but I think they have now redressed the balance between up-front cost and ongoing subscription fee. If you think of it as paying £29 per year for unlimited cloud storage and the 1-year free trial and 3-year extended warranty as a "bonus", it actually seems quite reasonable. At an initial cost of £380-£420, plus £29 per year, it is however still very much a luxury purchase and I think it may therefore be some time before it becomes so mainstream that people stop asking me what it is when I pull it out of my handbag!
If you have purchased the reMarkable or another similar device, please share your experiences in the comments below. Alternatively, if you're thinking of buying one and have questions not answered by my reviews, please feel free to ask!
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