What makes it different from a Moleskine
Moleskines are well-known and well-marketed. They are also made from 70gsm paper that bleeds with fountain pens, lacks page numbers, and has no table of contents. The Leuchtturm1917 addresses all three: 80gsm paper (better but not perfect for wet inks), every page numbered from the factory, and two pages at the front dedicated to a table of contents you fill in yourself. These are not dramatic improvements, but they are the right improvements for people who actually use a notebook as a reference document rather than something to write in and put away.
The dotted grid
Leuchtturm1917 offers ruled, squared, plain, and dotted options. Dotted is the most versatile: the dots provide enough visual reference to write in straight lines and draw straight margins, but they are faint enough that on a scanned or photographed page they are nearly invisible. The dots sit on a 5mm grid, which is the standard for bullet journaling and structured note-taking. Ruled pages feel constraining for diagrams; plain pages feel unguided for writing. Dotted is the consensus middle ground that the Bullet Journal community popularised and that has become the default for serious notebook users.
The paper and ink compatibility
80gsm paper handles fountain pen inks better than 70gsm, but it is not ideal for very wet or broad nib inks. Light show-through (visible on the reverse side) is present with most fountain pen inks. Heavy bleed-through occurs with very wet inks and broad nibs. For the Lamy Safari in F or M with standard Lamy ink, the Leuchtturm paper performs well. For serious fountain pen use with wet inks, the Rhodia Webnotebook uses Clairefontaine 90gsm paper which handles essentially any ink without bleed.
Other features worth knowing
The back pocket is useful — a flat, glued-in paper pocket that holds receipts, loose notes, or printed pages. The hardcover version is the standard choice: it holds its shape when writing on a surface that is not flat (your lap, a café table with a curved edge), and it protects the pages when the notebook is in a bag. The softcover is lighter and more flexible but the cover does not protect the pages as effectively. Both come in A5 (the most popular), A6 (pocket size), and B5 (larger). A5 is the right default for most people.
