8 iPhone Memo Tips
You're Probably Missing

Swipe down on the Home screen to open Spotlight, then type a keyword. It searches inside Apple Notes, Mail, and other apps that support search. A quick way to find past notes. Memos sent via Simple Memo are searchable in your email too.

In Safari, Photos and many other apps, tap the Share button and choose Notes. Instantly save URLs, images, or text you want to revisit later.

"Hey Siri, take a note: buy groceries on the way home." Siri turns what you say into a note. Useful when your hands are busy: driving, cooking, or walking.

Add a memo app widget to your Home screen. Recent notes are always visible, one tap to edit. Simple Memo opens straight to its input screen, ready to type 0.4 seconds after tapping the icon (developer's measurement, iPhone 16e, warm launch). On iOS 18 or later you can also open it with one tap from a Control Center or Lock Screen control (voice input starts right away on iOS 26 or later with a supported device and language).

When an important notification arrives, convert it into a note immediately. Copy from the notification, paste into your memo app. With Simple Memo, paste and tap Send, and it arrives in your email inbox.

Send memos to yourself via email and all your notes converge in one place. Accessible from any device, searchable, organizable. Simple Memo was designed for this workflow. See our Inbox Zero guide.

Write "Research X" or "Contact Y about Z" -- make the next action clear. Notes are triggers for action, not archives.

Once a week, review all accumulated notes. Convert some to tasks, file others as reference, delete what's no longer needed. See our GTD method guide.

Stuffing multiple topics into a single note makes them impossible to find later. Stop putting shopping lists, meeting ideas, and book titles in the same note. With the "one memo, one topic" rule, Spotlight Search finds things more easily. A memo can be just one line long -- what matters is keeping topics separate. With Simple Memo, each send becomes one email, which makes this rule easy to follow. The subject uses the note's first line (or a template or AI title, depending on your settings), so it doubles as a search handle.

Many people are great at taking notes but terrible at reviewing them. Set a fixed time each week -- like Sunday evening -- for a 10-minute memo audit. Review every note you wrote that week and sort them into three categories. First, "convert to tasks" and move them to your calendar or to-do app. Second, "keep as reference" and file them into folders. Third, "no longer needed" and delete them without hesitation. Without this habit, your memo app becomes a graveyard of text you never revisit. When auditing, sort by date to see your week's flow of thought -- you'll often discover new connections and insights.

Prepare for a lost or broken iPhone. Go to Settings, tap your name, then iCloud, then Notes, and turn on sync. Notes in your iCloud account then sync to iCloud (notes stored On My iPhone do not). On a new iPhone, sign in with the same Apple ID and your iCloud notes appear. For extra safety, keep important memos in email too, so they live in two places. Memos sent with Simple Memo arrive in the inbox of the address you set and, with Obsidian integration set up, are also appended to a note in your vault (email and vault are separate paths). Remember: digital data stored in only one place is always at risk.

Since iOS 16, you can add widgets to your Lock Screen. Place a memo app widget there to open the app straight from the Lock Screen (unlocking is still required). Long-press your Lock Screen, tap "Customize," tap the widget area, and select your memo app. You can place up to four small widgets below the time; tapping one opens the app. No hunting through Home Screens means the fewest possible steps to start writing. It is one of the simplest ways to cut the steps between an idea and typing.

The iPhone Shortcuts app lets you automate repetitive note-taking. For example, create a "Daily Report" shortcut that sequentially prompts for "What I did today," "Tomorrow's plans," and "Observations." Pair it with a daily 5 PM reminder, and running the shortcut when it fires gives you the same format every day. This works beautifully for "weight tracking," "reading notes," "meal logs," and other recurring memo topics. To build one, open the Shortcuts app, tap "+" in the top right, choose "Add Action," select "Ask for Input," and add an action to send the result to your Notes app or email.

On iPhone 8 and later, "Back Tap" is available. Go to Settings, then Accessibility, then Touch, then Back Tap. Back Tap runs system actions and shortcuts rather than apps, so first make a shortcut with the Open App action (choose your memo app), then assign it to Double Tap or Triple Tap. Now tapping the back of your iPhone twice opens your memo app. You can tap while pulling the phone from your pocket to open the app right away (unlocking is still required). The same way, you can assign a shortcut that opens Simple Memo. This enables one-handed memo-taking even while holding a subway strap. It takes one setting and is easy to overlook.