Use templates in Apple Notes

If you use Apple Notes daily like me, you may want to use templates to setup your daily notes quickly. Since Apple Notes doesn't have a built-in template feature. Here are some apps I found extremely helpful for templates.

Leverage Raycast Clipboard History

Templates are just special notes, one simple solution is to copy and save them to your clipboard history, you just paste them when you need them.
There are many clipboard management apps on Mac, I prefer Raycast, it's totally free and easy to use.

Create templates with Raycast

1. Download and install Raycast
2. Copy the note you want to use as a template
3. Trigger Raycast command menu (default: ⌥ space)
4. Search for Clipboard History
5. Search for your template or choose a pinned one
6. Press Enter to paste it into your Notes app

This is a template example:

You can setup a keyboard shortcut for Clipboard History (e.g. ⇧ ⌘ H), and then you can access your templates faster.

In Clipboard History, press ⌘ K and select Pin Entry to pin the template.

Whenever you need a template, you just press ⇧ ⌘ H to trigger Clipboard and choose one you like.

What about iPhone and iPad?

Raycast is only available on MacOS, thus iPhone and iPad users need other solutions. Luckily, there are many clipboard management apps on iPhone and iPad.

• PasteNow
• Paste

Both of them have a Mac version, thus you can use them on Mac as well.

NotesCmdr templates (Mac only)

NotesCmdr is an Apple Notes extension to help you work faster. It also has a built-in template feature.

Here are the steps to use templates:

1. Download and install NotesCmdr
2. Create a folder called Templates in Notes app
3. Put pre-defined templates there
4. Use the /template command to insert a template

Here is the demo video from the official site:

ProNotes templates (Mac only)

Like NotesCmdr, ProNotes is also an Apple Notes extension, there is a template feature as well.

Here are the steps to use templates:

1. Download and install ProNotes
2. Create a folder called Templates in Notes app
3. Put pre-defined templates there
4. Use the /template command or the title of your template to insert a template

Conclusion

You can use clipboard management apps like Raycast or Apple Notes extensions like NotesCmdr and ProNotes to create and use templates. Each option has its own advantages, so choose the one that best fits your needs.