I have been running both of these in parallel at two different companies for six months. Not a controlled experiment, but close enough to have useful observations. Here is the honest version.
Who this comparison is actually for
If your team is small and not deep in any particular ecosystem, this comparison probably does not help you much. This is for the people who are already in one of these ecosystems, considering whether to add the AI layer or switch, or evaluating which one to standardize on for a growing organization.
The search experience
Notion AI wins this clearly for conversational queries. You can ask it something like "what did we decide about the pricing model last quarter" and if the answer is in Notion somewhere it will find it and summarize it. The experience feels more like asking a knowledgeable colleague than running a search.
