How to Keep Your Notes Organized and Accessible in Notion (2024)

Perhaps you use Notion to help you stay on top of your tasks and projects, but when it comes to note-taking, you still open up a separate software such as Word or Pages.

You save your documents somewhere on your computer, and when it comes time to find them again, you need to use your search function. It doesn’t need to be that way. Notion is an excellent place to take notes, thanks to its text editor. It’s also simple to add annotations and visuals that will take your notes to the next level. Read on to learn more.

How to Take Excellent Notes in Notion

If you’ve yet to use Notion for note-taking, you’re in for a treat. Thanks to its over forty block types, you can pack your pages with as much detail as you’d like. You can also keep things simple by sticking with its basic blocks.

An important thing to remember is that you can transform these blocks later. That way, if you’re in a meeting or sitting in class, you can quickly jot down the information you need and work to annotate and add visual elements later.

By default, Notion uses the most basic block, Text. This saves you from choosing one if you need to type in a hurry. As you go, you can use bold, italics, colors, and highlighting just like any other word processing software.

Later, you can turn your text blocks into headings, lists, quotes, or callouts—or if you have time, you can start with these and style your document as you go. If you want to remind yourself to come back to a note, you can set a reminder in Notion quickly by typing @remind, followed by the date and time.

Adding Supporting Elements to Your Note in Notion

Text may be enough to get the point across, but if you want to take your notes to the next level, you can add some visuals with Notion’s Media blocks. You can find these in your commands menu when you scroll down to the Media heading.

There, you’ll have the option to add blocks with images, bookmarks, videos, code snippets, and files. Using these blocks will break up your text and make items like links, code, and files stand out.

If you’re unhappy with the size, you can adjust images and videos by grabbing its side and dragging it with your cursor. You can also make any block smaller, and change the layout, by positioning another beside it. Additionally, adding a cover and icon to your notes is another way to get creative and help them stand out.

How to Organize Notes Into a Page in Notion

If you simply create a new page each time you take a note, your Notion sidebar will get crowded. To prevent this, create a main page to store all of your notes, and add a subpage with each new document.

That way, all your notes are in one place, and they’re much easier to find later.

For example, you might have a page dedicated to meeting minutes, so you can quickly locate and reference them. If you’re an avid note-taker, perhaps a student, you could also have a main page dedicated to school notes with subpages for each class and the respective notes within.

If you find the page within a page thing challenging, think of them like folders on your computer—except they act as files as well. As you add notes to your page, rearranging them is a drag-and-drop effort. You can also add headings to group similar notes.

How to Organize Notes Into a Database in Notion

Were you wondering when this article was going to mention databases? Yes, keeping your notes organized is yet another way these blocks come in handy.

This is good news for those who love that extra bit of organization or benefit from more visual layouts. Whether you use a table, list, board, or gallery view, database properties will help you add quick reference details like dates, topics, links, and supporting files.

With databases, adding a new note is as simple as adding a new line to your table or list, or a new card to your table or gallery. If you’re newer to Notion, you can use its Class Notes template, found in the Student section, as a guide to help you create a table database for your notes. The Meeting Notes template under Marketing will also help you get started with a list database.

It's worth noting that you can add a new view to any database to switch back and forth between the layouts, for example, from a table to a board. While in a view that uses cards, you can display the cover image by clicking the three dots in the top-left corner of your database, selecting Layout, and changing Card Preview to Cover.

If you want to share your notes with someone else, you can click on the Share menu in the top-left corner of your page. Place their email in the field and click Invite. It's important to remember that your invitee can access any subpages within that page unless you manually go through and change that. So, if you only want to share a specific page, make sure you’re on it and check what’s in it. If you want to share them all, go to your main notes page and share that.

With Notion’s free account, you can share with up to five guests. If you upgrade to its Personal Pro account, sharing is unlimited. As avid note-takers, it’s worth mentioning that students can get the Personal Pro account free. So, if you’re in school and have a student email address, you can benefit from the extras that come with having a paid versus a free account with Notion.

Get Detailed With Notion

Not only will Notion help you stay on top of your projects and deadlines, but it will also help you take and maintain organized notes. It really is a one-stop software for all your productivity needs.

Keep in mind that you don’t need to pay for Notion to use all of its many blocks and templates. Other than sharing with more than five people, you can do everything outlined in this article with the free Personal account.