I’ve had my eye on MeePlus for a while, after seeing lots of positive mentions of them on Instagram and Reddit. So when they contacted me to offer a sample of one of their MeePlus SlimPad notebooks for review, I jumped at the chance!

MeePlus is a Hong Kong-based small business run by husband and wife Lora and Toby. MeePlus has only been around since 2023 but it seems like they’ve accomplished a lot in a few short years, offering a growing line of leather ring binder notebooks and accessories. So let’s take a look at what they sent me. There’s a lot to talk about!

First impressions: The MeePlus notebook arrived nicely packaged in a gifty box, with the notebook in a cloth bag. It came with padding inside to protect the rings. The Krause rings are good quality– well-aligned and nice and snappy.

MeePlus offers a variety of leather types and colors, as well as various sizes. I chose a pocket size Pueblo leather notebook in olive green. The green color is beautiful and it’s the perfect size! (3.86 x 5.59″, or 98x142mm) MeePlus is willing to make custom sized notebooks and I was almost going to ask them to make a special size for me. But when I realized that their standard pocket size notebook was already a bit narrower than a Plotter mini 6 notebook, I decided to give it a try, and I’m glad I did!

The pueblo leather is almost the same as Plotter’s, but it’s a little thinner and more flexible, which I like. It lies flat with no breaking in. The edges are less polished than Plotter’s, but they still look clean and tidy. The corners on the MeePlus notebook are rounded to a tighter diameter than Plotter’s. The interior texture is also a little different, but it has a similarly pleasant leather smell. There are no brand markings inside or out, so you can flip it front to back if one side pleases you more– it has the normal variations you’d expect in leather, with the same sort of scuffy texture as Plotter’s pueblo. It can scratch easily but if you rub it with your fingers, the scratches will fade and blend in to the overall patina. Over the couple of months I’ve been using it, it’s darkening, becoming a bit more shiny, and showing marks where it’s molding to the rings below. Many people use ring protectors to minimize this wear, but I don’t mind it.

Plotter was the first brand I saw using this type of metal spine– MeePlus has the exact same design, but without any branding engraved on it. The metal spine is a striking detail and it allows the spine to be more rounded, not squared off in a way that makes it much thicker than the rings themselves. The metal bar is nicer looking than round rivets, which would be the only other way to attach rings to a single layer of leather, at least that I know of. But I have never seen 11mm rings that attach by rivets anyway– usually rings this small have a thin, curved backplate that is designed to be sandwiched between two layers of a cover, and clips onto the ring base at the top and bottom. In any case, I can’t help wishing the exterior was all leather– if you use your notebook on a wooden surface, you may need to be careful about scratching the wood, even though MeePlus does slightly round off the edges of the metal so they aren’t too sharp. But I do like how this attachment method allows the spine to be more rounded, not squared off in a way that makes it much thicker than the rings themselves.

Despite a bit of extra width added by the metal spine, the MeePlus SlimPad feels nicely slim and flexible overall. It just feels good in the hand and would be more pocketable than most ring binders. It’s not quite as narrow as the Filofax Guildford Extra Slim, but it’s one of the closest I’ve seen, and the slight extra width gives it a little more versatility in allowing the use of index tabs: standard Filofax tabs stick out of the Guildford. The MeePlus notebook is just a bit narrower and taller than the Filofax Lockwood Pocket Slim, which to me, gives it better proportions. And despite having the same size rings, the minimal construction of the MeePlus makes it less bulky than the Lockwood.

Most of the other looseleaf notebooks I’ve used are Filofax organizers with various configurations of pockets. The minimal design of the MeePlus SlimPad notebook might sometimes make me miss having pockets but unless I’m using the notebook as a wallet, I don’t find myself using the pockets that much anyway. MeePlus and other companies make a variety of accessories you can use to add pockets, so it’s easy to adapt to your own personal preferences. I added some old Filofax accessories to mine– a plastic card holder and sleeve. (Not the current version of the plastic sleeve, which is wider– it just barely fits the Lockwood, and sticks out slightly from the MeePlus.)

MeePlus sent me some of the accessories they sell separately. I like the idea of adding a pocket but this card holder seems a little small to me, and I’d have preferred it without the pen loop. The other pen holder has a wide leather sleeve that will accommodate bigger pens. I never use pen holders but in this case, I prefer the leather sleeve as it doesn’t interfere with the inserts and closure of the notebook. It’s nice that the accessories are offered in matching leather.

MeePlus also included an assortment of their own refills. I was amazed at how many layouts they sent me, and there are even more on their website. Most are undated, but they have a few 2026 options that have just become available.

There’s a weekly layout that would function very much like what I enjoy using in my Nolty planner– a week on a page with a free-form facing page, in this case with squares.

The foldout habit tracker is nice– plenty of space to track up to 22 habits in one layout.

I don’t recall seeing a horizontal monthly layout like this before– the days of the month fitting on one side, with an open grid layout facing.

If you need a little more space you can use a foldout monthly plan, which has a grid on the back.

And there’s also a combo monthly foldout that has a few habit tracker lines on the bottom, with a grid on the back.

I won’t describe all the others– they almost deserve their own post! Most of the refills I received are a heavy, creamy, 120gsm paper, except for some basic dot grid sheets that use their “lightweight” paper, which is said to be made using a similar process to Tomoe River paper. Both perform extremely well with fountain pens– the lightweight paper has show-through, but nothing bleeds.

It’s impressive to see what a wide range of formatted and basic refills MeePlus has available— I don’t know if any other planner brand offers so many pocket size refill options, other than Filofax at their heyday in the 80s/90s! I actually counted, and Filofax currently offers 46 pocket size refills (not counting out of date calendars). Meeplus offers 8 lightweight, 28 basic, 28 colorful, 6 daily, 18 monthly, 12 weekly, and 8 yearly. Not counting a few that were crossed out, so presumably out of stock or discontinued. The prices seem very reasonable, but you have to pay attention to the sheet count– for instance, the week-on-two-pages layout is $7.00, but the pack size is only 40 sheets, so you’ll need two packs to cover a whole year. That is still cheaper than Plotter’s dated version at $15.00.

Plotter’s Pueblo binder in the comparable size is $145. The MeePlus SlimPad I received is $109. That’s not “cheap,” but I think it’s a great value given the comparable quality. They are also offering free shipping on orders over $50, and they are including all tariffs and duties in the price. For those of us in the US, that makes it an even better value vs. ordering directly from PlotterUSA, as Plotter’s free (domestic) shipping doesn’t kick in until your order is over $185. MeePlus also ship directly to Europe, where it can be a hassle to order Plotter.

The MeePlus Slimpad is a fantastic notebook that feels simple but luxurious. The slim, minimal shape will please anyone who’s been looking for alternatives to Plotter or Filofax’s Pocket Slim size notebooks. I’ve been happily using mine for a couple of months now and plan to continue. I can’t help wanting to try another one in a different color or size too, despite my large collection of other small looseleaf notebooks! But for something I enjoy using as much as the MeePlus SlimPad, I always want a spare.

I received free products from the manufacturer for this review, but all opinions are my own and I have not been compensated in any other way.