
The advantages to this method is that RTF files are broadly readable by any text editor, you preserve the ability for the notes to be edited, and the content in the RTF file can always be copied and pasted back into the Notes app if you want to. Copying & Pasting Content of Notes into RTF DocumentsĪ very low-tech method of backing up notes (while maintaining the ability for notes to be edited in the future), is to simply select all data from the note in question within the Notes app, copy it, then paste it into a fresh new rich text document in TextEdit and save it locally as an RTF file. Thus while this method backs up the notes content including text, drawings, and photos, it does not backup the Notes files themselves. The downside to using PDF notes exports as a backup method is that they can not be edited through the Notes app in the future. The exported note PDF is just like any other PDF file.

If you use iCloud Notes, all notes will be backed up automatically to iCloud, and sync to other devices using the same Apple ID. We’ll discuss a few ways to backup Notes on the Mac, from using iCloud, to exporting the notes as a PDF file, to getting the notes data into a more broadly compatible file format, to creating local backups of the Notes SQL database.
