Agree, the new tool bar decreases efficiency. Where I used to be able to quickly choose a tool, based on my own customization, I now have to click more times to get to what I want. Similarly with the inability to easily bookmark a page, I now have to look for the bookmark, than choose from a drop down if I want to have them on the side bar.

Totally agree, especially when I want to move stuff and the bar just blocks the view

Dear GoodNotes Support Team,

since the recent update to GoodNotes 7 (version 7.0.3 [3413431.108865178]), my workflow has become significantly more difficult. I had deliberately disabled automatic updates, because I was fully satisfied with GoodNotes 6, which worked smoothly and intuitively for my daily academic work.

Unfortunately, the new version has not improved anything for me — quite the opposite.
The new user interface feels less efficient and visually cluttered, and the keyboard text tool has become cumbersome to use.
I now have to:
• tap the edit icon every time I want to adjust text,
• manually switch back to the text icon each time I start a new note,
• and constantly deal with the floating text toolbar, which follows the text field and blocks important parts of my slides and annotations. + there is no possibility to save a text form and size as standard, what the...

This moving toolbar is extremely distracting and makes it hard to read or edit existing notes.
Overall, the writing and text editing experience — which used to be simple, fluid, and precise in GoodNotes 6 — has become slow, fragmented, and frustrating.

I have already tried every possible setting to restore the previous text editing behavior or revert to GoodNotes 6, but without success.
I would therefore kindly ask you to help me return to GoodNotes 6, or provide me with access to the previous version which retained the more efficient and user-friendly design.

GoodNotes 6 was perfect for my needs, and the recent changes have made the app almost unusable for my workflow.
I truly hope there is a way to revert or use a “classic mode” with the old interface and text tools.

Thank you very much for your understanding and assistance.
I look forward to your reply.

It cant even draw a straight line for me anymore 😂 im done. I draw basic duct designes and this app made it easy but now I won’t let me, anyone have any good recommendations for another app thanks

AGREE.
Why my highlighter always be ugly when it's in a dark page? I use GoodNotes because its toolbar is simple, with only one line. Why is it now two lines? This is really incomprehensible and extremely difficult to use. And this is during exam time, why is it like this?

Agree. This update has been a major downgrade for the app. I primarily use it for radiology notes, in which I hand-annotate radiological images. Trying to draw an oval around a structure is now impossible for some reason - it always autocorrects into a thin triangle. The updated toolbar is also significantly inferior to the previous one. Why did they choose to display way fewer options and increase the number of steps it takes to reach the tool you want? Very disappointed please fix these issues ASAP.

This new update is terrible, starting from the new toolbar which is not part of the classic blue frame. I was once a Notability user, and when they implemented this new design, which just occupies more space on the documents, I immediately switched to Goodnotes, and now even they added it. In my opinion, it just steals space from the page. Furthermore, the toolbar is now much more clunkier, it's less comfortable to switch from one tool to another, since you don't have everything in the same place anymore. Not to mention the shape drawing option, for which now you have just one color available which you need to change every time by choosing a new one from the whole catalog of colors, when in the past you had the same color palette from your pen tool. Even selecting your shapes is much clunkier, which makes the shape tool borderline unusable in my opinion (compared to the option of just do everything freehand).
Please, I have no idea why you thought this was a good idea but please either change it or give us the possibility to downgrade to the previous version. Even with no glitches, which are always understandable for any new big update, I don't see any improvements, only drawbacks.
Thank you for your time.

The new tool bar is killing me. My notes are taking longer because I have to do more taps to get to the tool I want. the highlighter won't highlight straight anymore. Also, the shape tool has its own colors that don't match my chosen pen presents anymore. Please please fix the straight line tool. I can't draw charts or get an actual straight line without using the ruler which adds more steps to my process. Lastly, the computer version now DOESN'T have an undo button, you have to go up to the top, press edit, then undo instead of just hitting the arrow like it used to be. I'm in med school and Goodnotes is my everything! Please put all the stuff on the old toolbar back!

Absolutely agree this newest update is god awful and I get so frustrated everytime I use GoodNotes now! Having to hold with two fingers to swipe, not having the tools in the same spot and it’s so glitchy

This is a terrible update from 6 with the useless drawdown tools menu. Can please please let us arrange the tools in the toolbar. I really regret paying for 7 after watching YouTube videos which are mostly version 6 and like it. Please do something !

Totally agree. Its quite a mess right now, and it makes you want to quit goodnotes.
The goodnotes team should check last app store reviews and make something about it.
If you copy paste a long text in a new page, you lose a lot of text cause the “add a new page symbol” stays at the end of the line and you cant see it, before that was working.
Now its quite hard to be texting in the whole page, change letter size and many other things. You lose more time trying to figure out how it works than studying.

This new update is horrible!!! And the fact that it wasn't optional just leaves a bad taste in my mouth. Literally in the middle of final exams and this is super inconvenient and makes me regret buying the life subscription. Switch back to GoodNotes 6!

I don’t understand the changes to the toolbar. I like taking colorful notes, and having to scroll to find the color I’m looking for instead of having them all displayed like before is incredibly annoying. It was one of the main reasons why I chose this app over others.
Also, it’s impossible to draw a benzene ring now, which as a chemistry major is, to say the least, very inconvenient. I truly hate this update and the fact that it wasn’t optional! One day I just opened my notes, and suddenly everything was awful. If this doesn’t change back soon, I will absolutely cancel my subscription and ask for a refund. This isn’t the app I paid for.

Please let us go back to Goodnotes 6. I can’t bare to draw another rectangle and it turn into a triangle. Or draw a benzene ring and it turn into a circle.

Sincerely, a pharmacy major

The new update is so frustrating and had changed the experience on many levels, i'm seriously considering quitting the app (after using it for years) simply because im not used to it any more

i'd really hope that they add the option to switch to earlier version

Adding my voice to everyone else's... everything about this update is horrible. I've been using Goodnotes for two years now for teaching geometry, and I had an amazing workflow going, and now it's all down the drain. The irony of losing the ability to ROTATE A SHAPE right as we were beginning our unit on ROTATIONS is especially maddening. I just don't understand why these changes were made. I have yet to notice any nice new features that were added, it seems like they only took things away and/or broke things that were previously working quite well?? I can't make sense of the thought process here. It's nice to know I'm not the only one feeling this way. If there's no fix soon, I'm going to have to consider switching to a different notes app, which would be a shame as I have 2+ years of notes on here.

I agree with what others are saying. The shape/diagram tool is pretty much unusable now. I am a tutor for economics, and this update has made creating graphs nearly impossible. The new toolbar is also clunky and awkward to use, which makes taking notes less efficient.

not just harder to use, some features were straight removed, like drawing lines, being able to create multiple text boxes without moving hand back up to toolbar to reselect text boxes tool, text auto deleting itself, etc.

This update is pretty much the talk of the entire engineering department. Teachers, students all use it to write notes, and the recent update is a masterclass on how not to do a software release.

Did you test this program at all? And if so, please fire whoever was responsible for debugging and writing tests.

I swear, releasing this in midterm seasons had to be intentional to try and get everyone to move away from goodnotes right?

The sting of buying goodnotes for life and then a week later getting this pile of garbage sucks.

Seriously, please let me use Goodnotes 6. If this was on android, I would've already just downloaded the Goodnotes 6 APK and blocked auto updates.

Adding my voice to this as I am also thinking of giving up on Goodnotes. From the looks of things, however, no one is listening.

Why not offer Goodnotes 6 to those who need it while fixing Goodnotes 7 instead of keeping us hostage?

I plan my days with this app and it’s ridiculous that something as simple as updating a digital planner makes me want to scream now. My heart goes out to the students who are pleading for their ability to efficiently take notes but are only being ignored.

This is very poor treatment of your customers.