Get to know OneNote

Organize your notes

Imagine having OneNote full of pages of notes, and you can’t find anything. What would you do?

Fear not, OneNote has you covered.

There’s a powerful and quick search feature in OneNote, which means that you’ll be able to find things when you need them.

To search, just click in the Search All Notebooks box, shown here, and then enter your search term or keyword.

Get to know OneNote

Notebooks and sections

A notebook is a container for a set of pages. Each notebook is divided into sections, and each section has pages.

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Just as a paper notebook has section dividers and pages within each section….

A OneNote notebook has section tabs. You can have as many sections as you need.

Think of it like this:

Get to know OneNote

Notebooks and sections

You can also have many notebooks; exactly how you organize your notes is up to you.

Notebooks and sections are right in front of you in OneNote; they’re part of what you always see in the OneNote window.

Get to know OneNote

Create notebooks and sections

Creating notebooks and sections is simple; the picture captures the process.

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On the Standard toolbar, click the arrow next to the New Section button.

On the menu, click what you want: Section, Section Group, or Notebook. (If you only want a section, you don’t have to use the menu. Just click the New Section button.)

Get to know OneNote

Create notebooks and sections

Creating notebooks and sections is simple; the picture captures the process.

3 You can get an overview of all your sections, section groups, and notebooks in the Navigation Bar. Just click the Expand Navigation Bar button to see everything.

Get to know OneNote

Move notebooks, pages or sections

You may want to move things around so that notes are easier to find or work with.

You can move sections and notebooks in the Navigation Bar. Just drag notebooks, section groups, or sections from one location to another, as shown here.

To move a single page, drag the page tab, either to another position in the same section, or to a completely different section.

Get to know OneNote

Unfiled notes

If you’re not a natural filer, do not panic.

You won’t have to search through OneNote, looking for the section you want, in each meeting you attend.

Instead, you can just start taking notes, then sort them out later. There’s a section called Unfiled Notes that’s designed just for this scenario.

Take notes in there, and then organize them when you have time. The Unfiled Notes section is where your screen clips and side notes go, too.