Google Keep is, hands down, one of those underrated apps that is pre-installed on your phone and offers a lot of utility, but isn’t talked about enough.
I use it practically every day for quick grocery lists, reminders, and jotting down interesting URLs I might come across. Still, as good as it is, it basically works like a digital junk drawer for me.
The problem with using Google Keep as a junk drawer is that when you have enough notes in it, finding the information you’re looking for quickly is too complicated.
A few months ago, my Keep app was full of half-finished ideas, shopping lists that were no longer relevant, article notes, and random reminders that just didn’t matter anymore.
Sure, I blamed the lack of organization on Google Keep and its focused feature set, but as it turns out, the problem wasn’t Google Keep. It was more about how I was using it.
Turns out the best feature for organizing my notes in Google Keep is labels, and I had been ignoring them for years.
While I knew about the feature, I never bothered with it because it looked too simple. Why spend time organizing quick notes when the whole point of Google Keep was speed?
After I started using labels properly, I realized that Google Keep had organization built into it, and it was surprisingly robust.
This feature helps fix the problem of clutter, and when combined with archiving my old notes, it made sure that my Keep stayed completely free of clutter. That’s just as important.
These Google Keep tricks finally stopped me from forgetting the important stuff
Here’s the system that fixed my forgetfulness once and for all
Labels make Google Keep feel less like a junk drawer
Organizing notes by context
It’s fair to say that at first glance, labels look like the least exciting feature in Google Keep.
They’re certainly not a major upgrade, and they do not offer robust organization in the style of what you would find on an app like Obsidian. They are essentially just tags.
But first, a bit of background. I used to rely on pinning everything that was even remotely important in Google Keep. If I knew I would need access to something, sooner or later, I pinned it, and it was useful for sure.
When your pin section becomes as crowded as the rest of the app, it starts losing its utility.
Labels, on the other hand, solve that problem because they replace the need to set each note on priority.
Here’s how I use labels.
I’ve started organizing my notes by context rather than by urgency. I have labels for article ideas, room improvement, shopping lists, travel planning, receipts, and quick references that I know I’ll need later.
Instead of scrolling endlessly or looking for pinned notes, I tap the right label and dive straight into that curated selection of notes that matter at the moment.
The biggest advantage of using labels is that they are more flexible than simple folders.
A note about buying camera gear for a trip can be placed both under shopping and travel without needing to be duplicated.
Similarly, if you take notes of restaurant recommendations, you can place them both under city guides and say something like favorites.
This means that when you’re organizing your notes, you can see them based on individual context.
If I’m sending references to a friend visiting my city, I can share all the notes in a specific city folder with them.
Also, when I’m looking for some of my favorite places to eat within my city, I have a more curated selection available for me.
This is in sharp contrast to folders that make you choose a single place to manage things.
Using label-based organization also makes search much better, and not in the way that you would imagine.
Yes, you can search by keywords within Google Keep, but if your notes are well labeled and organized, a single tap might be all you need to get to the relevant information.
Archive keeps your Google Keep clutter-free without losing your notes
Stop deleting useful notes
While using labels might be the biggest upgrade I have made to my Google Keep experience, there is one additional feature that elevates it further.
That is using the Archive feature, which stops your homepage from becoming a mess again.
For the longest time, my go-to strategy was to delete notes when I was done with them. For a lot of notes, that makes sense.
For example, a grocery list is something I’ll never need again, but a travel checklist is something I will need in the future. When I want that old checklist, I might have already deleted it.
Instead of deleting notes to clean up my Google Keep, I started using the Archive feature. Instead of deleting notes, it basically moves them out of the main view.
While they might disappear from the home page to keep your interface free of clutter, these notes still exist in the system.
You can search for them, and you can use labels to get to these notes, which have been archived from the home page.
Labels and Archive made Google Keep my only productivity app
I’ve dabbled in several productivity software and systems over the years.
A large part of that was because, much as I like Google Keep and its availability across platforms, I felt that it is not as capable at organization and management as some of the alternatives.
Sure, apps like Obsidian are certainly more capable, with a plethora of features, better layouts, and much more complex systems for managing your information. That doesn’t mean Keep is not as capable.
If you prefer a more streamlined and focused system, Google Keep has all the features you need, though you might not be using them.
The labels feature and archive have been available in Keep since the beginning. While they might not be the most exciting features, they solve the exact organization problems most people face.
Using labels means my notes are now much more organized and easy to get to whenever I need to. When combined with the archive feature, I tame the clutter on the home page of my Google Keep and truly bring the system under control.
That’s really all that I wanted from Google Keep to make it my go-to productivity tool.
I stopped looking at other alternatives, and you might do so too when you start using these two features in Google Keep.
