What survives the conversion and what does not
Every path from Evernote to Markdown starts with the same .enex file, so the losses are mostly the same. The differences are in attachments and notebook names.
| In Evernote | evernote2md / Yarle | Obsidian Importer | Scribelet direct import |
|---|
| Title, text, headings, lists | Kept | Kept | Kept |
| Checkboxes | Kept as - [ ] | Kept | Kept as - [ ] tasks |
| Tags | Kept (as text or frontmatter) | Kept, hierarchy lost | Kept as #tags, lowercased |
| Created and updated dates | Kept (frontmatter, file dates) | Depends on template | Not kept |
| Images and files | Saved to folders, links kept | Kept | Not imported |
| Notebook name | Yarle yes, evernote2md no | Via Stack@@@Notebook filename | Not in the file |
| Stacks | Not in the export | Filename trick only | Not in the file |
| Reminders and due dates | Lost | Lost | Lost |
| Links between notes | Break | Break | Break |
| Table formatting, merged cells | Lost | Lost | Lost |
| Encrypted blocks | Lost | Lost | Placeholder text |
Two things people expect to keep and cannot: the notebook structure and the reminders. The notebook structure is simply not in the file, which is why the filename tricks exist. Reminders are an Evernote feature with no Markdown equivalent, so you re-add them as dated tasks.
Which path to pick
You want files you own, with images. Convert with evernote2md or Yarle. The output is a folder you can open in any editor, sync anywhere and import into any Markdown app later. This is the archive path. Do it even if you also do something else.
You want to be in Obsidian. Use the Importer. It is the only path that recreates stacks as folders, and it previews the template before touching anything. Read the Obsidian vs Evernote comparison if you have not committed yet.
You want to be working in an app today. Import the .enex into Scribelet. It is the shortest path and the one with the fewest moving parts, with one honest cost: images and files inside the notes do not come along. For journals, meeting notes, recipes and reading notes that is rarely a problem. For a scanned-receipts notebook it is, so run that one through a converter and re-attach what matters.
Most people with a long Evernote history should do two of these: a converter for the complete archive, and a direct import for the notebooks they still use.
How to verify nothing was lost
Converters fail quietly. A note with a malformed table becomes an empty file; a 2 GB .enex times out halfway. Check before you move on.
- Count. Evernote shows a note count per notebook. Count the .md files (or the imported notes). The numbers should match exactly.
- Grep for the known failure modes. Search the output folder for
[encrypted content], for image links whose target file does not exist, and for files under 20 characters.
- Open three notes you know by heart. One with a table, one with a checklist, one web clip. If the table lost a column you will see it in seconds.
- Check dates if you care about them. Sort the output folder by modified date. If every file carries today's date, your converter did not set file dates and you need the frontmatter instead.
- Check the biggest notebook last. Large exports are the ones that fail halfway. Do the small ones first so you learn the tool on something cheap.
If a check fails, change the converter settings and rerun the whole notebook. Patching individual notes by hand is slower and leaves you unsure what else broke.
After the move: three cleanups worth the time
Tags. Ten years of Evernote tags means #toread, #to-read and #ToRead all exist. Open the tag list in your new app and merge. Scribelet lowercases and hyphenates on import, which removes the case variants but not the spelling ones.
Links. Every "see my other note" link is now plain text. Where the text still names the target, turn it into a [[wikilink]]. In Scribelet the backlinks panel then shows the reverse direction too, which Evernote never did.
Reminders. Search your old notebook for anything you had a reminder on and write it as - [ ] Task @due(2026-11-15). It is dull work and it is the step most people skip, which is how a renewal date gets missed in the first month after a migration.
Evernote to Obsidian specifically
The query people search most is the move to Obsidian, so one note on it. The Importer handles the conversion well, but it is desktop-only and it works one .enex at a time. For a 200-notebook archive, run evernote2md over the whole folder of exports first and open the result as a vault; you lose the stack folders but you finish in one command. For a dozen notebooks, the Importer with renamed files gives you the folder structure for free. Either way, read the Obsidian vs Evernote page before deciding whether Obsidian or a hosted Markdown app is the better long-term home.
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