How to Annotate and Highlight Notes in Evernote

Edited 2 months ago by ExtremeHow Editorial Team

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Evernote is a versatile note-taking application that enables users to efficiently organize their thoughts, ideas, and information. One of Evernote's essential features is the ability to annotate and highlight notes, which can enhance the clarity and visual appeal of your documents. Annotating and highlighting in Evernote allows you to draw attention to specific sections of your notes, making it easier to find important details later. This guide will walk you through the process of effectively annotating and highlighting notes in Evernote.

Understanding annotations and highlights

Before we dive into the how-to, let us first understand what annotations and highlights mean in the context of Evernote:

• Annotations: Annotations are comments, explanations, or notes added to a text or diagram. In Evernote, commenting on a note can include adding text, drawing shapes, or inserting symbols on images or PDFs to clarify or add information.
• Highlights: Highlighting means changing the background color of a text to make it stand out from the rest of the text. This tool is very important to draw attention to specific lines or passages that you find important or worth re-reading.

Getting started annotating in Evernote

To start annotating notes in Evernote, you need to be familiar with the types of files you can annotate. Primarily, annotations in Evernote are used on images and PDFs within notes. Here's a step-by-step guide to annotating in Evernote:

Step 1: Add an image or PDF to your note

Open Evernote on your device and create a new note or open an existing note. To add an image or PDF for annotation, do the following:

• Drag and drop an image or PDF file into the note area.
• Alternatively, click on the 'Attach' icon or '...' option to upload a file from your device.

Step 2: Opening the annotation toolbar

Once your image or PDF is in the note, launching the annotation toolbar is simple:

• Click on the image or PDF to select it.
• An annotation icon (often depicted as a pen or pencil) will appear, allowing you to 'annotate' the selected file.

Step 3: Using the annotation tool

The annotation toolbar provides various tools for editing and annotating your image or PDF:

• Text Tool: Add a text overlay to your image or PDF to provide comments or labels.
• Shape tools: Draw circles, rectangles, or lines to highlight specific areas on the file.
• Pen Tool: Freehand drawing with different colors to outline or underline sections.
• Stamp tool: Use pre-defined stamps, such as arrows or checkmarks, to mark specific points.
• Pixelate Tool: Obscure sensitive information using the pixelate option.

Make any changes you find necessary, then save and exit the annotation interface. Your annotations will automatically be saved to your note.

Highlighting text in Evernote

Highlighting is a useful feature for text in your notes. It ensures that important information stands out for future reference. Follow these steps to highlight text in Evernote:

Step 1: Select the text

The first step in highlighting is to select the text you want to emphasize. You can do this by clicking on the text in your note and dragging your cursor.

Step 2: Apply highlights

Once you've selected the text you want, highlight it:

• Right-click the selected text to open context options, if applicable.
• Select 'Highlight' from the toolbar options, which may appear as a highlighter pen icon.

The text will often receive a yellow background color by default to indicate that it is highlighted. Note that highlighting serves to draw attention without hindering the readability of the text.

Practical tips for annotating and highlighting in Evernote

Maximize your annotation and highlighting functionality in Evernote by considering these tips:

• Consistent use of colors and annotation types can create an easily identifiable system within your notes.
• Use annotations sparingly; too much visual clutter can distract from the main content of the note.
• Take advantage of the bookmark feature available in Evernote and mark important places, even if you're not highlighting or annotating them.
• Create a system for quickly referring to annotations by using numbers, letters, or symbols to create a cross-referencing list at the bottom of your note.

Conclusion

Annotating and highlighting are powerful features in Evernote that improve your notes by adding clarity and focusing on important information. By understanding and using these tools effectively, you can substantially enhance your note-taking and organization skills. While annotation primarily benefits images and PDFs, highlighting helps emphasize essential text within your written content. With practice and thoughtful application, these features can transform the way you interact with and review your notes.

Example use-cases

Let's consider some scenarios where annotating and highlighting can be particularly beneficial:

Academic notes

As a student, you can use annotations on lecture slides by marking key points directly on images and text highlights to underline important exam details in your study notes.

Project management

Project managers can annotate project timelines or flowcharts within Evernote, adding clarity to team assignments. Highlighting project milestones in text documents ensures they receive adequate attention during discussions.

Advanced features and considerations

Evernote is continually evolving, offering advanced features that can complement annotation and highlighting:

• Templates: Use note templates to streamline frequently annotated document types.
• Integrations: Integrations with apps like Google Drive or Slack can enrich your Annotative experience, and provide more context or opportunities to share notes.
• Search: Use Evernote's robust search function to quickly find notes with specific annotations or content.

Although annotations and highlighting are practical, it's important to balance them with the overall layout and readability of your notes to maintain a professional appeal. With a thoughtful approach, these tools can significantly enhance the way you organize and retrieve important information.

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