Bear is not good

General
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I wanted to share some honest feedback after using Bear for a while.

One of the things I initially appreciated about Bear was its focus and simplicity. I believe a notes app does not need to become an all-in-one workspace like Notion. Focusing on one core purpose is actually a strength. However, if the goal is to focus on one thing, the product should execute that one thing exceptionally well.

At the moment, the functionality feels extremely basic and progress feels slow. Many improvements that users have been asking for seem to go unheard, and it gives the impression that development is moving in a direction that is disconnected from user feedback.

As someone who works as a design engineer, I care deeply about product craft. When I look at the current feature set, it feels like even AI tools today can prototype more capable functionality.

Another shift happening right now is that users are increasingly able to create their own tools. Platforms and local app builders are making it possible to generate small macOS tools tailored to specific workflows. Many of these run fully locally, prioritize privacy, and allow users to control their own syncing solutions. This makes the competition landscape very different from a few years ago.

Because of these reasons, I’ve decided not to subscribe to Bear Pro and will be moving away from the app for now. I still respect the product and the design quality, which is why I wanted to share this feedback rather than simply leaving silently.

I hope the team considers listening more closely to user feedback and investing deeper in functionality while keeping the focused philosophy that made Bear appealing in the first place.

Thanks for building the app and for taking the time to read this.

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Unfortunately, I have to agree with the opinion about the slow pace of development and the strong reluctance to introduce changes that users have been asking for.

Will we ever see features like smart and regular folders, independent note sorting, custom theme color styles, proper multi-selection text operations, or reasonable text selection inside tables?

Are inline tag icons really all that the development team – which created one of the most wonderful text editors – is able to deliver?

I believe many of the missing features mentioned above could be implemented without breaking Bear’s existing paradigm. And many of us really want to see that happen.

Update:

I should have made this clear from the start — I don’t actually agree that Bear is a bad app. It’s still an absolutely great text editor. We simply expect a bit more today.

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@Koralfx @azlandotgg I do not think that any app should mainly add features users ask for. Sorry. Especially when you also applaused for focused design and philosophy. We as users all can have some ideas (I have them also) what would we appreciate in the app, but I can see the same discussion about “lack of user feedback implemented” everywhere else, in well designed and thought-over apps (Things app, Craft app) with the only exception being Obsidian, which design is (for me) chiefly catastrophic feature bloat, with nothing working 100%, but with you-can-have-anything approach.

So I rather prefer Bear 100% approach with very few well-thought features and I can tolerate that some of MY wishes are not fulfilled. And I am deeply grateful to the developers for that awesome app BECAUSE of it, because they also did not fulfilled next 100 features wished for by other users, which would clearly bloated the app for me. I would let them do their job.

By the way, we had these discussions about slow development and user ignorance in pre-Bear 2.0 era heavily, then applause for great 2.0 version came, and now again - complains about “slow development” and “missing features”. In spite of the fact that e.g. new web version appeared etc. Guys, this is minimalistic app by design. If you want Obsidian, go to Obsidian.

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It’s fair to want to move on to other apps. But the post should be titled: “Another back-handed post meant to shame developers for not being part of the hyper-consumerist, productivity app race-to-the-bottom”.

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I’m with @daneb1 and @Raph on this. I deeply appreciate the team’s obsession over detail, functionality, user experience and focus. It’s very powerful but it gets out of the way of the user, which is an increasingly lost art in the current landscape. Every feature Bear has is there for a reason. I roll my eyes when I read feature requests for AI integration, daily notes or whatever current buzzword happens to trend in the productivity sphere.

If you demand more, Obsidian is there, with a neverending feature set, very capable and ethical developers as well. It’s a stellar app, but Bear is not this, it’s a different value proposition. And for us who actually need a focussed tool, Bear is exactly what we want. Don’t let the door hit you on your way out.

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As for Obsidian, I think it is in many ways just as brilliant as it is terribly frustrating. I’m not sure which parts of the response were directed at me, but do you really think I’m asking for something big that would ruin the experience of using Bear?

It seems to me that a tool used for work or enjoyment shouldn’t be viewed so uncritically.

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Yes, I do, although it was more directed at OP (the thread title being absurd and borderline insulting to the devs). I am not viewing this uncritically. I have been a power user of Obsidian for years since the closed beta of 0.4, I have been on the Discord since the beginning and have interacted with the devs. Same here, I have been in the closed Bear 2 beta, interacted with the devs. I don’t pretend to know how the devs think, but I have been very, very deep into the rabbit holes of both apps and their philosophies and used both as daily drivers for years at this point. My two cents: I believe the reason you (and many people besides) find Obsidian terribly frustrating is exact the reason why Bear is not. Bear’s glacial pace of development is the price for a well thought out experience with nothing out of place and features only carefully evaluated. Obsidian’s amazing feature set (and, to be fair, well thought UX as much as possible in the context of an Electron app) is inevitably bound to entail terrible frustration unless you show amazing restraint.

Obsidian does everything under the sun. Bear walks a very tightrope of power Vs. simplicity and strikes quite a unique balance, I believe, where the basics are all covered at the moment. And let me tell you: I have been chomping at the bit for years when testing Panda, then Bear 2, cursing this pace of development, but in the end, it delivers a streamlined product which knows exactly what it is. Obsidian is also a terrific product which knows exactly what it is. And they are different things.

You can’t have an abundant feature set and a streamlined app. That’s just a contradiction of terms. The streamlining is a feature in itself and a value proposition, the same way people use Ulysses Vs. Scrivener, or iPadOS Vs. macOS, or a classical pocket watch Vs. a smartwatch, looking for different things. Wanting Bear to start adding features without the slow and obsessive consideration that makes the product (something we see regularly on those forums) is wanting to make a pocket watch start displaying notifications: that’s inherently absurd.

Bear is an opinionated product. For some people, like myself, who have wasted days crafting the “perfect system” in Obsidian, it’s an incredible asset because it means you get the tools you have, and you work with them, period. For others, it’s not, because they want AI, advanced automation, databases and the kitchen sink. It’s perfectly fine as well, but in that case, those people will be better served with Obsidian (or similar competition).

My point is: Bear is Bear. We users inform the development, but the devs are going to do their thing and the user base needs to accept that, because that is part of the value proposition. It’s a motorbike, if you need a roof and an additional set of wheels, you need a car. And there are other tools, “cars” which are also terrific and with comparably great company ethos (Obsidian), providing a different value proposition for different users.

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I’m comfortable using Bear, Craft and Roam Research to get the best out of each one. Craft is an excellent agenda for my work. It has daily notes, integrates my calendar and has tasks. I feel very well organized about my professional commitments using it. Roam, on the other hand, offers me the possibility of creating pages where I can collect blocks as references. This is wonderful for my research in philosophy. Yesterday, for example, I wanted to find Thomas Scanlon’s definition of rationality. I found it in seconds with Roam. You put your tags in blocks, your tags are pages, then you apply filters in the references of these pages. For me, it’s much better than tags and Bear’s search to be able to find specific blocks quickly. Bear, on the other hand, is the best text editor, the environment in which I like to write the most. I keep my personal journal in it and also write the first versions of my manuscripts. So, I extract what I think is perfect in each app and I don’t bother devs to transform their apps into what they weren’t designed to be. For example, nowadays, I even disagree with the inclusion of backlinks in Bear. I think they unduly gave in to the requests. The result is an experience that doesn’t come close to what we have at Roam. I use this feature on Roam all the time and I don’t even touch it on Bear.

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your subscription costs must be insane…

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Though I agree there are features I’d like to see that dont require shortcuts to do, but I also appreciate the focus devs show by keeping to their goals with the app. It works wonderfully for what it is right now and it’s the smoothest experience of an app on my Mac, also it’s $30 a year compared to other apps that cost that much in 2 months…

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What I’m looking for in Bear is the sense of calm that I don’t get from Obsidian (yes, I’ve wasted hundreds of hours trying to fix lists, writing plugins for text coloring, and enabling image resizing with the mouse wheel). In my opinion, that sense of calm isn’t even present in Craft (which I had high hopes for). To me, it has gone in a very bad direction — I honestly don’t understand that app anymore, it feels like a candy wrapped in several layers of packaging.

I know this is a general discussion, but I’ll give a simple example of a change in Bear that would significantly improve my workflow. In Bear, I have several “worlds”. Some of them are Work and Wiki. To avoid getting overwhelmed by the number of tags in the sidebar, I have to name them things like #wiki/something1, #wiki/something2, #work/something, and so on. Typing these long tags is incredibly tiring, even though the autocomplete works great. Adding simple, flat, single-level folders to separate these different worlds would help me a lot. That’s just one example.

I’m not asking for some kind of wild expansion of Bear, but there are a few things I’ve been waiting for — features that, in my opinion, wouldn’t make Bear lose anything in the eyes of its most devoted fans.

At the same time, it’s worth remembering — and especially the developers should remember — that in the end, we vote with our wallets.

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It is not, due to discounts.

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I believe workspaces, which have been heavily requested, are on the horizon. But, as we know: emphasis on horizon. :wink:

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to all:

if the goal is to focus on one thing, the product should execute that one thing exceptionally well.

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This is dangerous to say in the app space but I want talented designers and engineers to make choices for me. I want them to do this because I trust their judgement and I don’t want to spend my time fussing with knobs and dials in my favourite tool; I want to spend my time working.

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Try it. It would be an interesting experiment, even though I’d bet good money that it wouldn’t hold a candle to Bear.

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I disagree. Bear is one of the most well-designed apps I know (along with Things 3, perhaps). It has so many little handy features that using it is a pure joy. It’s minimalist, cozy, beautiful, and harmonious.

I deliberately chose Bear over Craft (I still have an annual subscription) and Obsidian because neither of them gives me the same joy of working with notes or that sense of home.

And I really love how clear the developers’ vision for their product is, and how carefully they approach updates. Bear is pure love; it’s an app with its own personality. I hope it stays that way (there are already more than enough 1000-in-1 Swiss Army knives with AI). :heart:

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But you know love is blind, right? (a Polish saying).:heart_eyes:

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Not sure I agree 100% with your sentiments. E.g. I want to be able to view markdown syntax, not unreasonable in a markdown editing app. Give me the option to turn it on - I’m not a baby - I’m pretty sure I’m able to discern for myself if I want to view markdown syntax in a markdown editing app.

Devs need to give users the option so that they can choose for themselves.

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This is literally the first option in Settings, if I understood your need correctly.

That said, I agree with those who say that there can’t be an option for everything, and I prefer strong design decisions over exaggerated customizability.

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