I'm using the paid version (I have a Professional plan but I still pay 49.99$ a year, which was the old price I believe). It's pretty great, but markdown support can sometimes be janky and I also have problems with sync from time to time. Also the apps make me re-login randomly, and one time the app thought I had a free subscription instead of a paid one and, because of that, ALL of my markdown notes were turned into plaintext notes. I still have to re-set them all, one by one, to markdown.
There is also 100GB cloud support for files, subscription sharing and a bunch of other stuff, but I'd rather see them work on making the whole experience more robust, instead of adding new features.
With the current prices I would not recommend upgrading to a paid version, and I'm also looking to switch to something more flexible and robust.
I'm not sure what you mean, as far as I understand Joplin has e2e-encryption