Evernote Now Syncs 4 Times Faster

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Image: Mashable, Christina Ascani

Joe White for AppAdvice 2014-01-29 23:00:05 UTC

Evernote has confirmed in a recent blog post that it's boosted the performance of its Evernote Sync service, meaning files stored in an Evernote account now sync between devices four times faster than before.

The news surfaced in an article penned by Evernote chief executive officer Phil Libin, in which he explains that the speed improvements have come as the result of multiple changes made to Evernote. First, the company has been quietly amassing more and more servers of late; after having launched the service with just a dozen, Libin notes that Evernote is now powered by over 700 servers across multiple data centers.

Second — and more importantly — Evernote has redesigned its server-side sync engines, and Libin highlights "four important requirements" for how this goal was to be achieved:

There should be no significant disruptions to the service and that all data would be preserved.

The transition should be completely transparent to our users, so all Evernote and third-party apps would be able to use the new sync engines without requiring any upgrades.

There should be significant improvements to performance when the new system goes live.

We would set ourselves up for fast and reliable service for years to come, factoring in the rapid increases in mobile usage, wearable devices, larger images, video and collaboration that we expect in Evernote.

Libin adds: "First, our Service team completely re-engineered the way that Evernote synchronizes your notes. After that, we migrated every single note, resource and bit of metadata onto the new sync platform. We also upgraded the hardware on some of our older servers. Then we tested. And tested. And tested some more."

Then after all that, the folks at Evernote gradually flipped the switch and sync speeds ultimately improved by four times. Impressive, right?

On the cards for 2014 are updates to Evernote's mobile apps, which are designed to take full advantage of this recent change to the service's sync architecture. "This will make sync even faster. Well also be updating our APIs and developer guidelines so our partners can turbo-charge sync, as well," the post notes. Libin adds that this year, Evernote is focussed on improving its core experience, and this change is definitely one awesome step in the right direction.

We'll keep you updated with further information as we receive it. In the meantime, you can pick up Evernote for iOS in the App Store free of charge.