Slow sync / No auto sync

[Thepeel89 1]

So I’m having an issue with the app not always syncing automatically between my devices. I use an M1 iMac, iPhone 13 and iPad Pro 2021. All of them on their latest OS version, and Evernote on the most recent versions on all of them as well. Sometimes I will edit a note or add a task on my Mac, and hours later, I will open the app on my phone or iPad and the content I added hours ago is not there. I wait and nothing happens. I have to go into the app settings and manually click on « Sync Now » and after this, it’s all good.

What’s weird is it doesn’t always do this, but it happens often enough for it to be a major annoyance to me. This only started a few weeks ago, it didn’t do it before.

[PinkElephant 8,285]

From my experience the app tries to reach the server right when I open the EN app on my iOS devices. Usually new notes appear in a matter of seconds, from my feeling maybe a little faster in the notes list view than in the Home dashboard view. 

Instead of going to the sync now option in settings, you can go as well to the notes list, pull it down a little with a finger and let go. If there is anything to sync, a syncing wheel indicator will show, and the notes load.

You can check in the app settings in iOS settings whether background sync is active. If your network is on the shaky side, you can as well switch mobile data on. Even with background sync, iOS will not allow major syncing, because it tries to hold battery use down. So a short moment after opening the app remains to download new content from the server.

[agsteele 2,980]

No. But you may find that the sync on the phone will only take place once you have brought the app forward on the device.

Your description indicates that the desktop is sync-ing to the servers. So your can focus your efforts on working out what is needed to get the phone to sync with the cloud in a timely fashion.

[gewappnet 80]

For me it takes up to a minute after opening the app on the iPhone or iPad until new notes created on other devices automatically show up. So either wait that time or tap on "Notes" in the first widget of the home screen and then pull down the notes list to update. That is the fastest way for manual syncing.

[agsteele 2,980]

That suggests that you are successfully sync-ing to the servers from the desktop app.

I suspect that the mobile apps need to be brought to the foreground before syncs take place. At least they take place more reliably when in the foreground.

 

[Thepeel89 1]

Do you mean I need to keep the app opened on my phone while I edit something on my desktop?

[Thepeel89 1]

8 hours ago, PinkElephant said:

From my experience the app tries to reach the server right when I open the EN app on my iOS devices. Usually new notes appear in a matter of seconds, from my feeling maybe a little faster in the notes list view than in the Home dashboard view. 

Instead of going to the sync now option in settings, you can go as well to the notes list, pull it down a little with a finger and let go. If there is anything to sync, a syncing wheel indicator will show, and the notes load.

You can check in the app settings in iOS settings whether background sync is active. If your network is on the shaky side, you can as well switch mobile data on. Even with background sync, iOS will not allow major syncing, because it tries to hold battery use down. So a short moment after opening the app remains to download new content from the server.

Thanks that works for me. Background sync is active but yeah going to the notes list is much faster so I'll keep doing this for now and hope it syncs automatically faster after an update at some point!

[Magnus Møller Petersen 14]

I'm seeing the same thing. Sync on iOS is very slow and doesn't seem to happen automatically. Using the latest and greatest versions of EN everywhere.

As an example I have a note I updated Friday after noon (it's now Sunday), where I added a new task to the note on my Macbook. This note has still not been updated on my iPhone, and I've tried to both pull down the list of notes, and also go and force a sync under settings. It doesn't work, and the note still hasn't been updated. In fact, most of my tasks on my iPhone still haven't been updated, and have wrong due dates and more because I updated those on my Macbook Friday afternoon too.

As a user of tasks I can say that this is not a very good experience and kind of disturbs the workflow -- I simply cannot trust that my iPhone is up-to-date. It also impacts the iPhone widgets. They still show the not-up-to-date tasks.Which makes them rather useless 🤪

The web client of EN is up-to-date as well. It's the iPhone app that's stuck in the past 😂 

I fondly remember that sync'ing was much more reliable in the past.

EDIT: I've just deleted and re-isntalled Evernote on my iPhone, and now everything is up-to-date (which of course makes sense...)

[PinkElephant 8,285]

Syncing for me is fast and reliable on iOS.

If it doesn’t work, and forcing it doesn’t neither, you can try to log out and back in the iOS client.

If it doesn’t work, log out, switch the iPhone off, wait 10 sec, on again (Apple logo must show), open the client and log in again.

Usually the logout does the job, no need to uninstall.

[Thepeel89 1]

For me it's been much better lately. It now auto syncs within 10 to 15 seconds after opening the app. However, I completely stopped using the Evernote tasks feature because, even if the app syncs fast when I open it, it doesn't sync in the background even though I activated background refresh in iOS settings.

I did the test, I created a task named TEST on my Mac and set a reminder for 1 hour later. I made sure not to open the app on my phone, and even 2 hours later, the notification had not appeared on my phone. Sure enough, I then opened the app and 10 seconds later, the TEST task appeared, but I did not get the notification.

I did the same test with Things 3, my task manager of choice, and background sync was fast and seamless and I got the notification. For my notes, it doesn't matter, but for tasks, this is kind of a dealbreaker for me as the notifications are not reliable and I missed quite a few reminders because I didn't think to manually refresh by opening the app after creating them on my Mac.

[pinto.*****@gmail.com 1]

Same here. Tasks have to be synced manually. I don't use them anymore. Notes take minutes to get synced. Evernote has become useless. It would have stayed as it was in the past. Too many features but no efficiency have ruined the app.

[PinkElephant 8,285]

You will not (by accident or intention) tell us more about the setup you are using ?

Because otherwise what you post is plain useless, could even be for the old clients (would not be the first posting of that type).

[talkingtobrian 0]

For the record, I have this same issue (though I'm on the last Intel MBP 16" and iPhone 14). It's so bad that I literally try not to edit certain notes on my laptop that I want to access on my phone in the next few hours, like my daily/weekly journal. Otherwise I'll end up with a string of duplicated notes that I have to reconcile.

No, it isn't my networks. This is literally the only service that gives me this problem. I love Evernote and I've put a lot of time into it, been a paid member a long time. But the slow sync is really hurting the professional workflow.

I have also seen the notes view being faster than the home view, but forcing refresh does not always really push the updates. And really, in 2023, I feel like we shouldn't be needing to do this.

[PinkElephant 8,285]

If it works in general from the iPhone, but the Mac is lagging, it may be the local database is corrupted.

You can rebuild it from the server, making sure it is a solid copy of the master database. Go to settings and uncheck „Keep a copy of my data on this device“, then log out. If asked confirm to dump all data. Quit the EN app, restart the Mac. Open EN again, and log in. It will now start to rebuild the local data from the server - which may take quite a while, depending on the data Volumen and the internet connection. So let the app running in the background.

[Boot17 1,490]

On 3/2/2023 at 9:28 AM, talkingtobrian said:

No, it isn't my networks. This is literally the only service that gives me this problem. I love Evernote and I've put a lot of time into it, been a paid member a long time. But the slow sync is really hurting the professional workflow.

I sync Evernote across two Windows machines and two MacOS machines and I've hardly ever had an issue with a slow sync. I don't doubt you have a problem, but it could be something local on your end... I'd take @PinkElephant's latest advice for starters if you haven't already.

[Dummut 0]

There is a good solution: https://mac.eltima.com/sync-devices.html

[PinkElephant 8,285]

To sync EN content, nobody needs or even is able to use a 3rd party synchronizer. EN is a closed shop with syncing, including security measures.

What you call a "good solution", may be good, but it is no solution.

[Dave-in-Decatur 3,985]

Or the "you" who is calling this a "good solution" may be a spam bot.