Moleskine Volant Extra Small Notebook Thoughts

I have not been too fond of these Volant extra small notebooks or Moleskine as a brand. Moleskine is a very overhyped brand in my opinion. Their products are not made with the greatest quality considering the price you are paying. They are extremely good at marketing and have established quite a name for themselves. I recommend you look elsewhere if you want notebooks with better paper quality. They may seem fine to you, but trust me, there are definitely better notebooks out there for a better value.

My biggest gripe with Moleskine is the quality of the paper. The paper is not nice to write on with any sort of pen, whether that's ballpoint, gel, or fountain pens. No matter what type of pen I've used, I've always had issues with smearing, feathering, and bleedthrough. That is not typical for ballpoint pens at all. Moleskine simply uses crappy paper that can't handle any pens whatsoever. I've been trying notebooks from Rhodia and Clairefontaine, and the difference in quality is extremely obvious. Don't skimp on paper.

Other than the paper, these notebooks are just like any other pocket sized notebooks. The covers are slightly thick cardstock type paper, which I'm not a fan of. I expected a softer cover. They've held up well, but then again, I've never pocket carried them. They always ride in my backpack. The pages are perforated if that's important to you. I have no idea how many pages these have exactly. There are a decent amount, so that's good. I'm struggling to fill both of these up, because I can't stand the paper. I do like that Moleskine offers tons of color options in their notebooks. These purple ones are awesome!

Overall, you aren't getting anything special considering the high price. I paid $6 for these two notebooks, and I'd say that's a ripoff. I would definitely not recommend picking them up at all. Get some nice Rhodia notebooks that actually have decent paper. You're better off buying generic notebooks. Try lots of different notebooks. I promise you, these Moleskine ones will be some of the worst you've ever used. Thanks for looking!