Psychotherapy Documentation Software Compared: How the Major EHRs Handle Notes

Two Kinds of "Documentation Software"

Search for psychotherapy documentation software and you will find two different product categories mixed together:

1. EHR platforms — SimplePractice, TherapyNotes, Jane App, TheraNest, and others. These store the legal clinical record and provide note templates, treatment plans, and intake forms alongside scheduling, billing, and telehealth.
2. Standalone documentation tools — AI note writers and template libraries that help you produce the clinical writing itself, which you then store in your EHR.

Most comparison articles treat these as competitors. They are not. The EHR is where your notes live; a documentation tool is how your notes get written. This guide compares how the major EHRs handle the writing part — and where a standalone tool fits alongside whichever EHR you use.

Disclosure: this site is operated by the team behind My Clinical Writer, an AI documentation tool referenced below. Our about page explains the relationship. The EHR information here is drawn from each vendor's published documentation, and none of these platforms sponsors this site.

How Each Major EHR Handles Documentation

This section covers documentation workflows only — not scheduling, billing, telehealth, or client portals. Feature details below are based on each vendor's published documentation as of mid-2026; verify current specifics on their sites, as features and plan tiers change.

SimplePractice

• Pre-built and customizable templates. SimplePractice ships a template library spanning progress notes (including SOAP, DAP, and group therapy notes), intake forms, scored measures, and treatment plans. Its template builder lets you customize any template or build one from scratch.
• Wiley Treatment Planners. Higher-tier plans include the Wiley Treatment Planner library — over 1,000 pre-written goals, objectives, and interventions organized by presenting problem, with selected goals carrying into progress notes.
• Built-in AI Note Taker. SimplePractice offers a native AI scribe as a paid add-on. It transcribes SimplePractice telehealth sessions (audio is captured for transcription and deleted immediately afterward — no recording is retained), and also works from dictation or uploaded audio/text files, drafting a note in your chosen template.
• Workflow character. Flexible and customization-first. The out-of-the-box notes are serviceable, and the platform expects you to shape templates to your practice. Budget setup time for that.

TherapyNotes

• Purpose-built behavioral health notes. TherapyNotes was designed specifically for mental health documentation. Its progress notes come in multiple pre-built formats — the standard TherapyNotes template plus SOAP, DAP, BIRP, and others — and combine dropdowns, checkboxes, and text fields.
• Treatment plan linking. Progress notes link session interventions directly to treatment plan objectives, and progress toward each objective can be documented per session — the strongest built-in support for the golden thread among these platforms.
• History carry-forward. Most note fields include a History button that shows what you entered in the same field in previous notes and lets you pull it forward.
• Custom templates and AI. TherapyNotes added fully customizable progress note templates, and its TherapyFuel AI features include generating a progress note from a written summary and a session scribe.
• Workflow character. Structured and compliance-forward. Clinicians who want guardrails tend to like it; clinicians who write narrative-style notes may find the structure confining.

Jane App

• Flexible charting. Jane supports SOAP, narrative, and hybrid charting, built from modular "chart parts" — text fields, checkboxes, images, body charts. Chart notes, intake forms, consents, and outcome surveys live in a single client record.
• Large template library. Beyond its own templates, Jane's community library includes over a thousand clinician-created templates, with psychology- and counseling-specific forms you can import and customize.
• Built-in AI Scribe. Jane offers an AI scribe that turns recorded sessions or post-session dictation into a structured chart note for review and signature.
• Workflow character. Multi-disciplinary by design — Jane serves physiotherapists, chiropractors, and counselors alike. The charting is pleasant and flexible, but mental-health-specific structure (treatment plan linking, behavioral health compliance fields) is thinner than TherapyNotes, and you will likely import or build your psychotherapy templates.

TheraNest

• Mental health templates with Wiley add-on. TheraNest provides behavioral-health intake, assessment, and progress note templates, with Wiley Practice Planners bundled into its top-tier plan — pre-written treatment plan and progress note content selectable by presenting problem, tied to the client's treatment plan.
• Group practice support. The platform handles group rosters and group session documentation, a common need in agency and group settings.
• AI Session Assistant. TheraNest (now part of Ensora Health) offers a recording-based AI add-on that drafts SOAP summaries from recorded telehealth and in-person sessions, with client consent required.
• Workflow character. Point-and-click assembly. The Wiley integration makes fast, compliant notes achievable, but heavily menu-assembled notes can read as formulaic — auditors increasingly expect session-specific narrative alongside structured content.

Documentation Workflow Comparison

Documentation feature	SimplePractice	TherapyNotes	Jane App	TheraNest
Mental-health-specific design	Yes	Yes	No (multi-disciplinary)	Yes
Pre-built note formats	SOAP, DAP, group, more	TherapyNotes, SOAP, DAP, BIRP, more	SOAP, narrative, hybrid	Standard formats + Wiley content
Custom template builder	Yes	Yes	Yes (chart parts)	Limited
Community/shared template library	Template library	Pre-built library	Yes, extensive	Wiley (top tier)
Treatment plan–note linking	Wiley goals carry into notes	Strong (per-objective progress)	Basic	Via Wiley content
Prior-note carry-forward	Load previous note content	History button per field	Duplicate prior chart entries	Reuse prior notes
Built-in AI documentation	Note Taker (transcription/dictation add-on)	TherapyFuel (summary + scribe)	AI Scribe (recording/dictation)	AI Session Assistant (recording add-on)
Best documentation fit	Customizers	Structure-first clinicians	Narrative writers, multi-disciplinary clinics	Wiley-based workflows

Details reflect vendor-published information at the time of writing; pricing and plan availability for specific features (Wiley libraries, AI add-ons) are listed on each vendor's site.

What EHR Documentation Does Well — and What It Leaves to You

Every platform above solves the same three problems: structure (required fields prevent incomplete notes), integration (notes are automatically part of the chart, with timestamps, signatures, and audit trails), and compliance scaffolding (formats and required elements that satisfy payer and board expectations).

What none of them solves is the writing itself. A template gives you "Interventions: ____" — you still produce "Utilized cognitive restructuring to examine automatic thoughts related to workplace performance anxiety, identifying the core belief 'I am not competent' and developing a balanced alternative." That translation from clinical thinking to clinical language is where most documentation time goes, and it is the part a form cannot do.

The EHRs' own answer is the ambient AI scribe — recording or dictation-based drafting, now available in all four platforms above. Scribes reduce typing, but they introduce audio capture into the therapy room, add informed-consent weight, and tie your documentation workflow to one platform. Our guide to AI tools for therapists covers the recording-versus-input distinction and the HIPAA questions to ask before adopting any of them.

Where a Standalone AI Note Writer Fits

A standalone AI documentation tool sits between your clinical thinking and your EHR. My Clinical Writer is our tool in this category: you enter your post-session observations — presentation, interventions, response, plan — and it generates a complete draft in your preferred format (SOAP, DAP, BIRP, GIRP, or narrative), which you review, edit, and paste into your EHR. No session recording is involved, and it works identically with every platform in the table above.

The combined workflow:

1. Choose your EHR for practice management — scheduling, billing, telehealth, portal.
2. Draft notes in the AI tool from your own clinical input, in the format your setting or payer requires.
3. Paste the finalized note into your EHR, where it becomes part of the signed legal record.

This decouples note quality from EHR choice: switch platforms and your documentation process comes with you. For a comparison of the AI tools themselves — including ambient scribes and EHR built-ins — see our best AI clinical note writers guide; we will not repeat its rankings here.

Decision Framework by Practice Type

Solo private practice, mostly self-pay. Documentation pressure is lighter — you need clean, defensible notes more than payer-proof structure. Jane App or SimplePractice give you flexible charting; pair with a template library (like this site's free templates) or an AI note writer if drafting is your bottleneck.

Solo or small practice, insurance-heavy. Medical necessity and the golden thread drive everything. TherapyNotes' per-objective treatment plan linking is the strongest built-in support here. Whatever EHR you choose, make sure every note references a treatment plan goal — an AI tool that prompts for goals and interventions helps keep the thread intact.

Group practice. Consistency across clinicians matters as much as individual speed. Standardize on shared templates (SimplePractice's builder or TherapyNotes' custom templates), and prefer documentation tools that produce uniform structure regardless of who writes the note. TheraNest's group session features are worth evaluating if you run therapy groups.

Multi-disciplinary clinic. If therapists share a roof with physio, chiro, or medical providers, Jane App's cross-discipline charting is the natural fit — then supplement with psychotherapy-specific templates and a mental-health-focused writing tool, since the platform itself is generalist.

Agency and community mental health. You likely do not choose your EHR. Focus on what you control: your input quality and your drafting speed. Standalone, EHR-agnostic tools and format-matched templates work regardless of the system your agency mandates.

The Bottom Line

Among the EHRs, TherapyNotes offers the most structured behavioral health documentation, SimplePractice the most customization, Jane App the most flexible charting for mixed clinics, and TheraNest a fast Wiley-based assembly workflow. All of them are competent record systems; none of them writes session-specific clinical language for you, and their built-in AI answers all involve recording or dictation.

So choose your EHR on practice management grounds — that is where the platforms genuinely differ for your business. Then decide separately how your notes get written: EHR templates alone, free templates from a library like this one, an ambient scribe, or a clinician-input AI tool. The record system and the writing tool do not have to be the same product, and for most therapists the strongest combination is one of each.