In Q1 2024, I rejected a batch of 2,000 notebooks because the paper felt wrong. It was 80 gsm instead of the promised 90 gsm—a difference you can feel on the first page. That's my job. I'm a quality compliance manager for a stationery company, and I review anything that's going to carry ink before it gets near a customer. Over four years, I've audited tens of thousands of notebooks. And the question I get asked more than anything isn't about paper behavior. It's about size.
Specifically: should you buy a Rhodia A6 notebook or a Rhodia A7 notebook? And once you've got the size question, there's the deeper one: journal vs diary, which are two different ways to use the same pages. Let's set up the comparison before I get into specifics. I'm going to compare the A6 and A7 across four dimensions—portability, paper and tool behavior, purpose, and realistic cost. I'll also explain why I changed my mind about pocket notebooks since I started this job.
A6 vs A7: The Obvious Difference Is Less Obvious Than You Think
First, the standard. According to ISO 216, an A6 sheet is 105 × 148 mm. An A7 sheet is 74 × 105 mm. That means A7 is exactly half the area of A6. In practical terms, the A7 is a small memo pad, and the A6 is a real notebook.
The conventional wisdom says "choose the smaller one because it fits in your pocket." My experience says the opposite. The Rhodia A7 notebook is small enough to slide into a shirt pocket, but that's also its problem. It ends up under the seat, in a bag, or behind your phone. The A6 is still pocket-friendly—it fits in an inside jacket pocket or a cargo pocket—but it's not so small that you disassociate from it. It demands to be used.
Here's a specific number from my audit notes: in a six-month review of returns and product feedback, the A6 had a significantly higher "everyday carry" rating among our customers. The A7 got described as "cute" more often than "useful." That's not a complete sample—our data comes from about 2,400 buyers—but it lines up with what I see in the warehouses. The A6 gets carried. The A7 gets collected.
Actually, let me pause on this. Every spreadsheet analysis I did pointed to the A7—it's lighter, smaller, easier to ship. My gut said the A6 would feel more like a notebook. I went with the data, and we watched the A7's completion rate lag behind. That gut feeling wasn't nostalgia. It was just understanding that human beings want a page that doesn't feel apologetic.
Paper Behavior: The Highlighter Test
Now let's talk about what's inside. Rhodia's classic Web notebooks use 90 gsm paper according to the product specs on Rhodia's site (rhodia.com, accessed January 2025). Both the A6 and A7 use the same stock, so the paper behavior isn't a differentiator between sizes—it's a differentiator between Rhodia and cheaper notebooks.
I run a highlighter across every paper sample I audit. It's a boring test, but it tells you a lot. On the Rhodia paper, a normal highlighter stroke leaves a shadow on the reverse side, but it doesn't make the back unusable. If you use a heavy brush marker or a very wet fountain pen, you'll see more show-through. There's no magic "zero bleed" paper. But for everyday writing and yellow highlighting—yes, the A6 and A7 handle it well.
The size difference matters less here than the physical writing position. In the A7, your hand is more cramped. If you're left-handed or just have large hands, the A6 gives your palm a place to rest. That's not a paper issue, but it will affect how long you can write before you stop.
Journal vs Diary: The Question That Decides Everything
People use "journal" and "diary" like they're synonyms. In my experience, they're not. A diary is a log of what happened: date, appointments, expenses, work log. A journal is a place for thinking: ideas, drafts, reactions, messy definitions. Both can live in the same notebook, but they need different amounts of space.
The A7 works beautifully as a diary. It's compact, chronological, and you don't need a large canvas to say "wrote 500 words" or "met with supplier." The A6 is a better journal because your thoughts need room to stretch. I've seen people try to journal in an A7 and quit. It's not because the paper is bad. It's because the physical format doesn't match the mental volume.
So the question you need to answer before choosing a Rhodia A6 notebook or a Rhodia A7 notebook is simple: are you keeping a diary, or are you keeping a journal? If the answer is "both," get the A6 and use the A7 as your index or daily log.
A Markup Calculator View of Cost
Let's talk about price. I keep a markup calculator on my desk because part of my job is approving spec changes that hit margins. The retail difference between an A6 and an A7 is usually a few dollars—based on current listings I checked in January 2025. On the Rhodia site, the A6 sits a few dollars above the A7. If someone is selling these at a 50% markup, the difference in profit is smaller than the difference in how often the customer actually uses the notebook.
Here's the math that matters more. Say the A6 costs $10 and you keep it in rotation for three months. That's about eleven cents per day. Now say the A7 costs $6 and you carry it for two weeks before it buries itself in a drawer. That's about forty-three cents per day for a notebook you're not using. The cheaper notebook is the more expensive one.
I'm not saying the A7 is a waste. I'm saying the money calculation only works if the tool gets used. The markup on a used notebook is trivial. The markdown on an unused notebook is 100%.
One caveat before you order: my experience is based on a specific segment—premium paper notebooks and the people who choose them. Honestly, if you're a list-maker or a phone-only note taker, your mileage will differ. I've only worked with paper that was designed for wet ink, and that's a bias.
Final Call: A6 or A7?
So, after four years of quality reviews and a lot of returned notebooks, here's how I'd decide.
Choose the Rhodia A6 notebook if you're a journaler, a writer, a fountain pen user, or someone who needs room to annotate. It's the one I'd pick for a single do-it-all notebook. It handles a highlighter, it handles a wet fine nib, and the size still fits in a jacket pocket.
Choose the Rhodia A7 notebook if you want an appointment diary, a work log, or a field note pad for one-line entries. It's not a mini version of the A6. It's a different tool. When I see A7 notebooks succeed, they're almost always used for notes that never need to become sentences.
The fundamentals haven't changed: people still need a place to write. But the best practice from 2020—carry the smallest notebook you can—has shifted. Your phone already handles the tiny notes. The notebook's job now is thinking, and thinking needs room. For that job, the A6 is the safer choice. For logging, the A7 is still a great sidekick.
Looking back, I should have standardized on the A6 years ago. I thought the A7 was more elegant. It is. But in practice, I filled three A6 notebooks in the time I made it through one A7.
