> phone apps too cumbersome

To your point, I tried to make voice activated journaling thingie using Shortcuts. Turrible UX.

I really just need a physical "record" button. Maybe the Watch's new customizable action button would work.

Don’t know about the watch, but the new iPhone supports this feature as a built-in action.

I'm mostly recording music where I've got things set up in advance vs needing to quickly capture something on the fly but I've liked the Zoom H1n, Sony PCM-D100, and Sony PCM-A10

I can see that these are indeed targetting musicians and are way more sophisticated instruments than what I'm looking for. I'm still grateful for the info!

Thanks for sharing!

There are some ridiculously cheap voice recorders on Amazon.

The H1N is a good compromise between size and simplicity and audio quality - not super cheap, but not professional prices, and a good step up.

I picked that one up while traveling and I'm surprised at how good that little guy ended up being. It's lightweight and even without an external mic holds up pretty well. It's the one I tend to grab when I just want to record a melody or a few chords.

There are smaller and simpler ones if you don't need super high recording quality. The Sony PX470 for example.