Top 8 Annotation Tools (Features, Pros, Cons, Pricing)

Looking for the best annotation software?

Whether it’s business professionals or teachers, when asked to choose between scribbled notes and a well-labeled document, we’re sure they’ll pick the latter.

Annotation Software

Annotation software marks a document or piece of content with anything a user wants, like text, an image, shapes, signatures, and more!

A color-coded and properly labeled document helps present your thoughts clearly.

And annotation tools help you do just that.

But with hundreds of such software in the market, which one should you pick?

In this article, we’ll cover what an annotation tool is and highlight eight popular annotation software available today. We’ll go over their key features, pros, cons, and pricing to help you pick the best one.

This Article Contains:

Let’s get started!

What Is an Annotation Tool?

An annotation tool is a text or drawing tool that helps you add information to text, an image, a database, or any other piece of content.

But that’s not all.

These tools can also be used on various formats such as a whiteboard or PowerPoint presentation, to annotate the selected content. And we’re not just talking about business or education content.

Annotation software is even used in fields like gene ontology!

For example, Genome annotation or DNA annotation tools help annotate the gene location in a genome.

Not the DNA that you’re thinking of!

Confused?

Click on the above gif to know what we meant.

And that folks, was an example of web annotation.

What’s web annotation?

A web annotation is the addition of information to resources present on web pages.

For example, adding tags to GIFs of Korean boy bands in a blog post is an example of a web annotation.

Now, while we’re on the topic of examples…

What are annotations examples?

Since annotation is essentially just marking and adding tags to sections of content, there are tons of examples out there.

Here are a few common ones:

Adding informative tags to an unlabeled dataset (data labeling) like a spreadsheet
Using a line tool or a pencil tool to draw on the screen during a presentation
Highlighting important text in a shared document with a highlighter tool
Labeling your lunch as “do not touch” when you store it in the company fridge

(Well, maybe not that last one)

But if you think annotation is just about adding manual notes to the content, think again.

What are 3 types of annotations?

Manual annotation: the manual annotation type is exactly what it sounds like – it covers the process of manually annotating a piece of content
Screen annotation: the annotation of a desktop screen with the help of a screen marker software is known as screen annotation (you commonly use these during Zoom meetings and other video conferences)
Collaborative annotation: collaborative annotation is a teaching strategy to help students develop critical thinking, reading, and writing.

Top 8 Annotation Tools in 2022

Here are the top eight annotation software that’ll make annotating your projects a cakewalk:

1. ClickUp

ClickUp Annotation Features — ClickUp’s Annotation feature allows teams assign comments on files for faster collaboration

ClickUp is the world’s #1 project management tool.

But wait… you’re looking for annotation tools.

Why would a project management tool help?

That’s because ClickUp has advanced built-in annotation features to help you with all your annotation needs. And since it’s a comprehensive project management solution, you can use it for more than just annotation tasks!

From productivity monitoring to resource management, ClickUp can handle anything you throw at it!

Let’s see why ClickUp is the best annotation tool available today:

How do you annotate?

ClickUp’s Annotation feature supports PDF file and image annotation (.png, .gif, .jpeg, .webp).

You can easily add comments to task attachments in 4 simple steps:

Open the desired attachment within a task
Click “Add comments” in the upper right of the preview window
Click on the attachment preview wherever you want to add a comment
Add comments and assign them to anyone if you want them to take immediate action

Voila!

Your added comment will now appear in the comments tab next to the attachment. Now the assigned comment will appear in the assignee’s Home tab as well as in the task’s comments section.

What’s more?

For added flexibility, you can even use ClickUp’s Chrome Extension for annotation and proofing documents. You can use the Chrome extension to markup images, upload them as a task attachment or add comments to the attachment — with ClickUp everything is possible!

Other key ClickUp features

Docs: easily create, share, and store project or company-related documents with your virtual or in-house team
Comments: each ClickUp task offers a dedicated comment section that you can use to easily discuss and share any relevant file or links. You can even tag team members to ensure your comments aren’t overlooked.
Collaboration Detection: know when your teammates are simultaneously adding a comment or viewing a task in real-time. This can be extremely useful to overcome some common virtual team challenges you’d face in remote project management.
Notepad: a free space to jot down your thoughts and ideas quickly
Mind Maps: create free form mind maps to plan and organize your project-related ideas

ClickUp pros

User-friendly interface
Offers a feature-rich free version
Can easily assign tasks to team members
Easy task management with the drag-and-drop feature
Efficient resource management with more than one assignee for a specific task
Manage and track your project timeline with intuitive Gantt Charts
Custom Access Rights help to share your projects with clients without compromising privacy
Can quickly find all your project resources with the Smart Search feature
Attempt project tasks in the right order with Task Dependencies
Agile dashboards to measure your project progress with charts like Velocity, Burnup, Burndown, and Cumulative Flow
Can customize how you receive project notifications
Offers app integrations with various third-party apps for seamless project management
Available as web browser, desktop, and mobile apps

ClickUp cons

No white-labeling available (can’t remove brand icon)
Can’t export Dashboards

But don’t worry, at ClickUp, we’re constantly working to overcome such minor flaws.

Click here to learn more about what’s cooking in the ClickUp kitchen.

ClickUp pricing

ClickUp has three pricing options:

Free Forever Plan: includes unlimited projects and members + 100MB of cloud storage space
Unlimited Plan ($7/user per month): supports unlimited projects and members + forms + unlimited number of integration + advanced reporting + unlimited Gantt charts
Business Plan ($12/user per month): includes unlimited projects and members + unlimited Proofing + timesheets + two-factor authentication + sprint points + Google single sign-on + custom exporting

2. Filestage

Filestage is a good proofing and annotation tool to help you annotate a PDF file as well as videos and audios.

Filestage key features

Add annotation to comments with markup tools
Add attachments to include reference files in comments
Use their dashboards to manage all review-related workflows
Threaded comments facilitate clear discussions
Easily review audio and video files with time codes

Filestage pros

Can easily track file status during the review process
Can add due dates to avoid missing deadlines
Easily integrates with third-party apps
Can add attachments in comments to enhance collaboration

Filestage cons

Cannot undo an approved annotation action
No support for web annotation
Cannot assign tasks to team members

Filestage pricing

Filestage offers three pricing tiers:

Starter ($99/month): includes 15 active projects + basic project structure + basic support
Pro ($249/month): includes 35 active projects + advanced project structure + priority support + 10 team members + project template
Enterprise (custom pricing): supports more projects + custom workflows + more team members

3. Prodigy

Prodigy is a data annotation tool that creates evaluation and training data for machine learning models. And while this data tool could act as a prodigy for annotation, it’s not what’d you call affordable for most teams.

Prodigy key features

Offers text annotation for any script or language
Allows text classification with multiple categories
Annotate NLP (Natural Language Processing) relations to label your data
Image annotation tool for tasks like object detection, image classification, and segmentation

Prodigy pros

Suitable for novice users
Along with text and image annotation, can annotate audio clips as well
Evaluate any model with randomized A/B testing
Offers live demo and documentation for ease of use

Prodigy cons

Supports collaboration annotation only for small teams
You’ll need a separate tool for managing projects
Doesn’t offer advanced semantic segmentation feature
Expensive

Prodigy pricing

Prodigy comes with two pricing plans:

Personal ($390/lifetime license): offers a lifetime license + unlimited projects + unlimited annotator
Company ($490/seat): includes “personal” features + flexible and transferable floating licenses

4. Annotate

Annotate is a document collaboration platform that helps make the document annotation process a breeze, from the first draft to the final sign-off. However, if you’re looking to annotate on the move, this might not be the tool for you.

Annotate key features

Perform text or image annotation with the help of figures like text box, polygon or freehand notes
Easily create notes within a document and assign them to team members
Communicate over document and workspace chat while reviewing documents
Draft your own documents and export as Word or PDF documents

Annotate pros

Supports custom integrations with third-party apps
Ability to create workflows within documents
Restricted access for external collaborators

Annotate cons

Doesn’t offer Android and iOS mobile apps
No support for task and project management
No calendar feature to manage your work schedule

Annotate pricing

Annotate offers three pricing plans:

Free: supports up to 3 users + text annotation + document workspaces + full text search + in document collaboration
Standard (contact the sales team): minimum 3 users + includes “Free” features + freehand annotation + notifications + document metadata and tagging
Enterprise (contact the sales team): includes “Standard” features + unlimited storage + unlimited users + document comparisons

5. PDF Annotator

PDF Annotator is a PDF annotation tool that lets you add notes and annotations to your PDF documents. This annotation software enables you to add comments, signatures, and designs, making PDF annotation super easy.

PDF Annotator key features

Can type your comments right into the document
Freehand annotations with the Pen Tool
Add stamps, signatures and page numbers to the document
You can easily add markup and insert images
Import and export pdf annotation across different document versions

PDF Annotator pros

Offers an embedded image editor
Convert your document to any format like doc, xls or ppt
Can extract, move or delete selected pages from a document

PDF Annotator cons

Adobe DRM protected documents cannot be opened
Only available for Windows operating systems
Cannot annotate digital signature protected documents

PDF Annotator pricing

PDF Annotator offers 3 buying options (prices vary for 4 users and above):

Annotator License: $69.95/user
Student License: $39.95/user
Faculty License: $69.95/user

6. Drawboard Projects

Drawboard Projects is a PDF markup software tool that offers a wide range of markup features like text tool and polygon tool. You can even annotate your documents with digital ink. However, if you’re looking to organize your annotations easily, you might want to look elsewhere.

Drawboard Projects key features

Markup any PDF file or drawing
Pin an issue to a specific area on drawings to provide context
Offers a time-restricted review link for guest access
Add tags to a file to enhance the searchability

Drawboard Projects pros

Collaborative markup and text annotation
Can easily assign and track issue progress
Integration with apps like Google drive and Procore
Offers offline documentation support

Drawboard Projects cons

Cannot organize projects into folders
Only offers Windows 10 and iOS apps
Integration with limited applications

Drawboard Projects pricing

Basic ($24/user per month): supports up to 1000 drawings or documents + unlimited projects + third party app integrations
Standard ($44/user per month): offers unlimited drawings or documents + unlimited projects + email support + third party app integrations
Enterprise (contact Drawboard team): includes “Standard” features + federated access logins (SSO) + priority support

7. Doccano

Doccano is an open-source text annotation tool. With its simple user interface, you can easily upload your desired dataset and start annotating.

Doccano key features

Ability to perform sentiment analysis on text data
Offers text classification that can be exported as plain text, CSV, JSON formats
Supports data annotation feature of sequence labeling
Sequence to sequence learning for training data models

Doccano pros

Simple, user-friendly interface
Auto label with trained machine learning models
Can annotate text of any language
Open source annotation software

Doccano cons

Can lag and become unresponsive at times
Can shuffle the annotated pieces only when self-hosted
Requires coding-heavy setup

Doccano pricing

As Doccano is open source, it’s a free annotation tool.

8. lnk2Go

Ink2Go is a simple screen recording and screen annotation software. Its user-friendliness makes it an excellent candidate for any live presentation or seminars.

Ink2Go key features

Write, draw or highlight any content on desktop or apps like Sticky Note
Screenshot, screen capture or record your desktop with the added annotations
Offers a built-in digital whiteboard or blackboard for better user experience
Annotate across multiple pages simultaneously

Ink2Go pros

Supports webcam for presentation and seminars
Can annotate on extended or shared screen
Floating drawing tool bar with the ability to align both horizontally and vertically
Multiple pens, highlighters, and shapes like a rectangle for high-quality presentations

Ink2Go cons

Limited toolbar items
Irregular software version releases
No live customer support

Ink2Go pricing

Ink2Go offers both Windows and Mac apps with a 15-day free trial. However, a single license costs $19.99.

Bonus Tool: Markup Hero

Markup Hero is a screenshot and annotation tool that is web based, easy to use, and includes a bunch of helpful markup controls including: callouts, highlight, signature, crop, pen, shapes, colors, blur, and more. In Markup Hero, annotations are not flattened so you can edit you markup forever. Organize annotations with collections, search and naming, and share instantly with a link or copy to clipboard.

Markup Hero key features

Always editable markups
Multi-page markups and insert images
Share links with permissions
Chrome Extension for scrolling screenshots

Markup Hero pros

Annotated images, PDF’s, Google Docs, and Websites
Works on any device including mobile
Good for screenshots and annotations
Easily embeddable into Slack, social and even ClickUp tickets

Markup Hero cons

No video capture
No team accounts (yet)
No custom domains

Markup Hero pricing

Markup Hero has a forever free plan with limited monthly annotations and you try the tool without even making an account. Unlimited markups and full features on the Super Hero plan is only $4.00 per month.

Conclusion

A well placed, detailed annotation is one of the easiest ways to add value to your content. It’s what can transform a boring piece of data into something as exciting as this:

Well, maybe not that exciting.

But you get the point.

Luckily, choosing an annotation software that fits your needs doesn’t have to be as difficult as perfecting English grammar!

Just go through the 8 options for annotation tools we covered here for a head start.

And while each of these tools is great, ClickUp smashes it out of the park with its powerful features that help you proof your documents easily.

From image and PDF proofing to a feature-rich Forever Free plan, this versatile annotation software hits the home run.

Questions? Comments? Visit our Help Center for support.