These are the two notebooks most people are choosing between when they decide to upgrade from whatever they've been using. Both are well-made, both come in satisfying hardcover formats, both have devoted followings — and both have real weaknesses that advocates don't always mention. This guide compares them honestly, so you can make the right choice rather than the popular one.
The short answer, if you need it immediately: Leuchtturm1917 has better features and is the better choice for fountain pen users. Moleskine has better brand recognition and a warmer, creamier paper that some writers prefer. Neither is objectively better; they suit different people. Read on to find out which is you.
The basics
Leuchtturm1917
Made in Germany, distributed globally. Founded in 1917 (the name refers to both the lighthouse — Leuchtturm — and the founding year). The A5 Hardcover Notebook is their signature product: 251 pages on 80gsm paper, hardcover, thread-sewn binding, two ribbon bookmarks, elastic closure, a back pocket, a numbered-page table of contents at the front, and sticker labels for the spine and cover. Available in an unusually wide range of colours, sizes (from pocket to A4), and ruling styles including dot grid, which Leuchtturm made genuinely popular in the notebook world.
Moleskine
Italian brand with a French-influenced heritage, now owned by a global group. The Classic Notebook — black hardcover, rounded corners, elastic closure, ribbon bookmark, expandable back pocket — has been an icon of café culture and creative professionalism since the 1990s. Approximately 240 pages on 70gsm cream paper. Available in several sizes and ruling styles. The design is deliberately minimal and has barely changed since the brand's modern relaunch.
Paper quality: the most important difference
Paper is where these notebooks diverge most significantly, and it's the factor that matters most for everyday writing.
Leuchtturm1917: 80gsm, bright white
The Leuchtturm uses 80gsm paper — the standard benchmark for "acceptable" paper quality, and in this case executed reasonably well. The paper is bright white with a slight tooth — enough texture that graphite and ballpoints feel natural on it. It resists most pens without significant feathering or bleedthrough, though with very wet fountain pens or broad nibs, bleedthrough becomes more likely. Show-through (the ghost of writing visible on the other side of the page) is present but manageable.
For fountain pen users: the Leuchtturm works with fine and medium fountain pen nibs in standard dye-based inks without serious problems. Broad nibs, wet inks, or shimmer inks may cause issues. It is not a fountain pen-optimised paper, but it's significantly better than the Moleskine for this purpose.
Moleskine: 70gsm, cream-toned
The Moleskine's 70gsm paper is lighter than the Leuchtturm's and has a warmer, more ivory tone. Many writers find the cream colour easier on the eyes for extended sessions, and it gives the notebook a more traditionally literary feel — the paper that Hemingway (allegedly) used to write on, though the brand's heritage claims are more complicated than they suggest.
The problem is that Moleskine paper is notoriously poor for anything other than ballpoint pens, pencils, and some gel pens. Fountain pen inks feather on Moleskine paper, often badly. Markers bleed through. Even relatively well-behaved inks will produce noticeably fuzzier lines than they would on a better paper. If you use a fountain pen, the Moleskine is a frustrating experience. If you use a ballpoint or pencil, it's perfectly pleasant.
Features comparison
Leuchtturm1917 has significantly more features than Moleskine, and they're all useful rather than gimmicky.
Numbered pages: Every page in a Leuchtturm is numbered. The Moleskine has no page numbers. This sounds minor; it becomes meaningful if you ever want to index your notes, reference an entry, or use a bullet journal system (which relies on page numbers for its index). The Leuchtturm was designed with the bullet journal community in mind.
Table of contents: The Leuchtturm has six pages of table of contents at the front, with printed page-number fields ready to fill in. The Moleskine has no equivalent.
Two ribbon bookmarks: The Leuchtturm has two ribbons; the Moleskine has one. Small, but convenient for keeping multiple places in a working notebook.
Perforated pages: The Leuchtturm includes twelve perforated pages at the back that tear out cleanly. Moleskine has no perforated pages.
Labels: The Leuchtturm comes with sticker labels for the spine and cover — useful for identifying notebooks when you have more than one. A small thing, but thoughtful.
The Moleskine's advantages are almost entirely aesthetic: the clean black cover, the rounded corners, and the sense of continuity with decades of creative mythology. These things have real value to some people and none to others.
Size and format
Both are available in similar size ranges. The most common comparison is Leuchtturm A5 Hardcover versus Moleskine Classic Large (which is close to A5 but not quite — at 13 × 21cm, it's slightly narrower than true A5).
If precise A5 page size matters to you for fitting with other A5 documents, the Leuchtturm is the correct choice — it's a true A5. The Moleskine's Classic Large is a proprietary size that doesn't correspond to a standard paper format.
Leuchtturm also offers a true A6 (pocket) size, a B5 size, and an A4. Moleskine's equivalent formats are similarly varied, though again using proprietary sizing in some cases.
Ruling options
Both offer lined, blank, and grid/squared options. Leuchtturm's dot grid — a 5mm dot grid — is arguably better designed than Moleskine's, with dots subtle enough not to distract from writing or sketching. Leuchtturm also offers a "plain" option (truly blank, without even a faint grid) and a ruled variant with slightly finer lines than Moleskine's.
Durability and binding
Both use thread-sewn bindings and lie reasonably flat when open. In practice, neither will hold perfectly flat without being pressed — you'll need to hold the cover back with your hand or break the spine slightly. The Leuchtturm opens somewhat flatter in our experience. Both bindings are durable for everyday use over a year or more.
The covers of both are hardcover boards covered in textured faux-leather material. They feel similar in the hand. The Leuchtturm elastic closure is slightly more secure than Moleskine's in our experience, though both work adequately.
Price
The two notebooks are priced very similarly in the UK market — within a pound or two of each other for equivalent formats. Neither offers particularly good value compared to Japanese alternatives at the same price point, but both represent a reasonable investment for a quality everyday notebook. At similar prices, the Leuchtturm's additional features make it the better value proposition for most buyers.
The verdict: who should buy which
Buy the Leuchtturm1917 if: you use a fountain pen (or might do soon); you want page numbers and a table of contents; you're interested in bullet journaling; you want two ribbon bookmarks; you care about having a wide colour range; or you simply want more features for the same money. The Leuchtturm is the more versatile notebook and performs better with a broader range of pens.
Buy the Moleskine if: you write primarily with a ballpoint or pencil; you prefer cream paper to white; the aesthetic and heritage of the Moleskine matter to you personally; or you specifically want a notebook that fits Moleskine-branded accessories and pen loops. There's also something to be said for the Moleskine's absolute simplicity — no features beyond the essentials, a clean black cover, a familiar form. Some people find this appealing rather than limiting.
What if neither is quite right?
The honest truth is that neither the Leuchtturm nor the Moleskine is the best notebook available at their price points if fountain pen performance is your priority. Both are outperformed on paper quality by alternatives that may be less famous but are substantially better to write on.
For fountain pen users who want a hardcover notebook: the Rhodia Webnotebook uses 90gsm Premium R paper in an ivory tone that is genuinely excellent for fountain pens — virtually no bleedthrough, fast dry time for the grade, beautiful sheen and shading. At a similar price to both the Leuchtturm and Moleskine, it's the better choice if ink performance is your priority. The Webnotebook is stocked by The Journal Shop.
For writers who want the best everyday paper: the Midori MD Notebook uses MD paper — a cream-toned paper developed in 1960 and continuously improved since — that is smooth, fountain pen-friendly, and considerably more characterful than either the Leuchtturm or Moleskine paper. It comes in a slightly different format (a softcover with a subtle texture) but at a comparable price with superior paper quality.
For bullet journalers specifically: the Leuchtturm's dot grid A5 Hardcover is genuinely the most popular bullet journal notebook in the world for good reasons — the numbered pages, the table of contents, and the dot grid format were all made for this system. If bullet journaling is your use case, the Leuchtturm is the clear choice over the Moleskine.
A quick comparison table
| Leuchtturm1917 A5 | Moleskine Classic Large | |
|---|---|---|
| Paper weight | 80gsm | 70gsm |
| Paper colour | Bright white | Cream/ivory |
| Fountain pen performance | Adequate (fine/medium nibs) | Poor (feathering with most FP inks) |
| Page numbers | Yes | No |
| Table of contents | Yes (6 pages) | No |
| Ribbon bookmarks | Two | One |
| Perforated pages | Yes (12 pages) | No |
| Ruling options | Lined, dot grid, plain, squared | Lined, dot grid, blank, squared |
| Size | True A5 | Proprietary (slightly smaller than A5) |
| Colour range | Very wide | Limited |
Browse both notebooks — and the full range of quality alternatives — at The Journal Shop. If you're still not sure which to choose, our full notebook guide covers every format we stock and what each one is best for.
Where to start: browse our notebooks and fountain-pen-friendly notebooks at The Journal Shop.
