Comparison Moleskine Squared Notebook A4 Black vs Moleskine Two-Go Notebook Grey

The format determines the size of the sheet in the notebook and, accordingly, its dimensions in length and width. Here, the standard clerical designation with letter "A" with a number is traditionally used. Nowadays, there are such options:

— A3. The largest of the formats used in modern notebooks: A3 sheet size is 420x297, or twice the A4 (see below). Such products usually do not have a leaflet (see below) and are more like sketchbooks than notebooks in the regular sense of the word; accordingly, they are intended mainly for artists.

— A4. A format known as the "standard landscape sheet"; the actual dimensions are 297x210. Despite the general popularity, it is quite rare among notebooks: a product of such dimensions is not compact, and it is not very convenient to carry. Such notebooks are designed primarily for those who need "space" for notes or sketches.

— A5. Such a sheet is half the size of A4, its dimensions are 210x148 mm. It is one of the most common in modern notebooks, as it offers a good compromise between compactness and space for writing/drawings.

— A6. A sheet corresponding in size to a quarter of a landscape (A4) — its dimensions are 148x105 mm, which is comparable to a standard photo and makes it easy to carry a notebook in your pocket. At the same time, there is not muc...h space on the sheet, respectively. It is worth paying attention to such products if compactness and ease of carrying play a decisive role.

— A7. The most compact of the formats found in modern notebooks is half the size of an A6 sheet, 105x74 mm in size. Such a sheet is very tiny and requires saving space while recording; on the other hand, an A7 notebook will fit in almost any pocket without any problems.

Note that it is not about exact compliance with the formats — usually, the actual dimensions of the notebooks may differ slightly from the accepted standard. However, in general, this parameter quite allows you to navigate in size.

Ruler refers to the layout of the pages of a notebook. It differs depending on the purpose.

— Plain. Plain notebooks have blank pages. This is useful primarily for free sketches and other works of fine art, where extra elements only get worse.

— Grid. Notebooks with a grid layout, like school notebooks. Well suited for working with numerical information, solving mathematical exercises, creating tables, drawing graphs and charts.

— Ruled. Ruled notebooks will be useful for operating with textual information — from key moments at a meeting or press conference to poems and prose of your own composition, sudden ideas, etc.

— Dot grid. The dots with this layout are arranged so that they form squares that imitate a grid. Something similar happens if, on a page with a grid of lines, put a dot at each intersection of the lines, and then somehow remove the lines, leaving only dots. These notebooks are indispensable for technical projects where you often have to deal with straight lines and angles: dots provide a very convenient base for drawing. At the same time, the finished drawing has a minimum of unnecessary elements, because many (if not all) of the points end up covered by the pattern.

— Combined. Notebooks consisting of several parts with dif...ferent types of layout: for example, one half is folded from blank sheets, and the second is marked with a ruler. This provides versatility: one notebook can be used for different purposes.

— Hobby. Layout optimized for use in a specific area of human activity. These products include notebooks for storing recipes, cataloging books or films, records of food and drink tastings, options for dog lovers, cats, other pets, for adherents of a healthy lifestyle, and much more. Usually, models with a “hobby” layout have several specialized sections, and the variety of markup even in one notebook is very large.

The grammage of the paper used in the notebook primarily depends on its thickness and durability. In addition, this parameter often determines the quality in general: thick paper usually belongs to a higher price range than lighter paper. For comparison, it can be noted that the thinnest packaging paper has a grammage of about 20 g/m², the density of a standard “office” paper is 80 g/m², and 150 g/m² material is already referred to as cardboard.

Keep in mind that a more grammage and, accordingly, thicker paper correspondingly increases the thickness of the product (ceteris paribus).