Notion for Beginners: A Crash Course
Want to take notes, plan projects, organize documents and collaborate with team members all in one place? You can, with Notion.
Marie Kondo may have inspired your home organization practices, but those personal and professional workspaces need to stay tidy, too. And that doesn’t just mean your desk—it also means your tasks, projects, plans, notes, goals and files.
That’s where Notion comes in. With this nifty productivity and note-taking software, you can stay organized and on-schedule, all from one centralized platform.
What Is Notion, Anyway?
OK, so you know that Notion can be categorized as productivity software. But what does that mean, exactly?
In Notion’s case, it means that it can be used to:
- arrange, schedule and prioritize tasks;
- create a shared calendar;
- take and organize notes; and
- upload, store and share files.
Notion is different from other productivity tools because it’s highly (and we mean highly) customizable.
Where traditional list-making apps might limit you to creating single vertical lists, for example, Notion allows you to group together several lists on one page and arrange them in any way you see fit.

Similarly, Notion also allows users to create and modify tables of information called databases. Depending on what the user wants to do, these can be used to create an address book, wishlist, pricing sheet, comparison chart or anything in between.

That’s just the tip of the iceberg, too. There’s a wide variety of ways to customize Notion, but it’s also simple enough for anyone to use. And for beginners and seasoned software users alike, that’s a valuable combination.
Notion Pricing
Like many of its competitors, Notion makes money via a tiered subscription model. This is good news if you only want to use Notion for yourself, because individuals can access it for free.
Compare each of Notion’s price tiers to determine which one is best for you:
Free
Costs $0.
Includes:
- Unlimited pages and blocks for one user.
- Sharing with up to ten guests.
- File uploads of up to five megabytes each.
- Seven days of page history.
- API access.
Plus
Costs $8 per month when billed annually, or $10 per month when billed monthly.
Includes everything in Free, as well as:
- Unlimited file uploads.
- Sharing with up to 100 guests.
- Thirty days of page history.
- Priority customer support.
Business
Costs $15 per user per month when billed annually, or $18 per user per month when billed monthly.
Includes everything in Plus, as well as:
- Ninety days of page history.
- Sharing with up to 250 guests.
- Private teamspaces.
Enterprise
Cost varies according to your needs; contact Notion for more information.
Includes everything in Business, as well as:
- Unlimited page history.
- Sharing with up to 500 guests.
- Advanced teamspace permissions.
- Customizable admin roles.
- Detailed audit log.
- A Customer Success Manager provided by Notion.

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Notion’s Standout Features
In addition to its basic functionality, Notion boasts several features that set it apart from the productivity software crowd.
Templates
If you want to spend less time customizing your pages and more time getting organized, Notion has a library of easily-accessible templates.
Whether you want to use a template for a quick note, to-do list, lesson plan or something else entirely, Notion’s collection of templates has you covered.

Widgets
From a Spotify widget that can play your favorite music to a weather widget that can display the current temperature in your location, there’s a plethora of fun and functional widgets to choose from.
Just copy the provided HTML code, paste it into the appropriate field on your Notion page and boom, you’ve got a working widget.

API
If you’re a developer, then you’ll love how easy it is to use Notion API (Application Programming Interface). With it, you can modify your Notion workspace’s databases, page content, files, media, comments and more.
Need some inspiration to get started? Notion’s code examples can help.
Integrations
Fortunately for any user who doesn’t like switching between apps, there are Notion integrations.
These include:
- Slack
- Asana
- GitHub
- Zapier
- Google Drive
- Trello
- and many more
How to Use Notion
Ready to start organizing your work life, your personal life and heck, even your cat’s life? Get Notion and start exploring its features.
Download Notion
The version of Notion you download will depend on the platform you’re using. You can choose between:
- Notion for Mac and Windows if you’re on desktop; and
- Notion for iOS and Android if you’re on mobile.
Even Notion’s free Personal plan includes syncing across devices, so don’t worry about downloading the desktop version now if you want to use mobile later and vice versa.
Once you have Notion downloaded and installed to your device, you’re ready to get started.
Create a Page
Now for the fun part: creating your first Notion page.
After opening the Notion app, navigate to the left-hand menu and click the button labeled “+ add a page.”

Once your page is created, you can title it anything you’d like and start populating it with text, widgets, lists, images or anything else.
Take Notes
To use Notion as a note-taking tool, simply create a page and start typing. That’s it!
If you want to keep it simple, you can always use one of Notion’s provided templates. Or if you’d like to create your own unique note from scratch, be sure to read up on Notion’s basic writing and editing tips.

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Upload Files
You can upload all kinds of files to a Notion page, from images and videos to audio files and entire documents.
To upload an image, for example, hover over a new line and click the “+” icon that appears in the left margin. Or, type “/image” and hit your enter key.
Next, either upload an image from your computer, paste an image URL or choose a stock photo from Unsplash. Whatever option you choose, it will instantly appear on your page:
Collaborate
The first step of collaborating with colleagues, friends and family on Notion is sharing your page with them.
To do so, click the “Share” button in the top right corner of the page. There, you can either make the page public and share it with anyone via a link, or enter the names individual people into the provided empty field:

Notion Alternatives
Find out how Notion compares to some of its top competitors and alternatives.
Notion vs. Evernote
The main difference between Notion and Evernote is that Evernote is primarily designed to provide a place where users can take and organize notes. Notion does the same thing, but it also aims to provide users with project management tools, collaboration, file storage and more.
Both Notion and Evernote offer completely free plans, as well as paid plans with additional features.
Notion vs. Obsidian
If you’re trying to decide between Notion and Obsidian, consider that Obsidian is mainly focused on letting users create knowledge graphs using plain text notes. On the other hand, Notion focuses on allowing users to create pages, lists and databases using rich text and media files.
With both Notion and Obsidian, personal accounts are 100 percent free. Obsidian’s paid plans include both subscription-based and one-time-payment-based options, while Notion’s paid plans are subscription only.
Notion vs. OneNote
While Notion uses a page- and block-based organization system, Microsoft OneNote uses a notebook-based one. OneNote also allows users to handwrite notes, draw or doodle with their tablet stylus, while Notion does not.
Like Notion, OneNote is free to download. However, you’ll need to pay for a Microsoft 365 subscription in order to access all its features.
Notion vs. ClickUp
Most of Notion’s competitors are note-taking apps and not much else, ClickUp is the exception: It’s another productivity software that claims to do it all. Overall, ClickUp has more features and functionality than Notion. However, it can be more complex to set up and use.
Both ClickUp and Notion have free personal plans, as well as subscription-based paid plans with more advanced features.
Notion vs. Asana
Asana is a tool that’s mainly focused on project management and task organization, while Notion takes on note-taking and in-depth customization options as well. In general, people who only want a project management platform will be happy with Asana. But for people who want to make unique pages and express their creativity, Notion may be a better fit. And since Notion supports Asana integration, you can even use both at once.
Asana is free for teams of up to 15 people, but larger teams will need to purchase a subscription-based plan. Like Notion, Asana has no one-time-payment options.
Notion vs. Coda
These two apps are undeniably similar, with both allowing users to create and link their own pages and spreadsheets, as well as use templates. The main difference is that Coda places extra emphasis on database functionality, while Notion comes out on top for note-taking.
Both Notion and Coda have free versions, with paid subscription-based plans available for those who want or need them.
Notion vs. Trello
Like Asana, Trello focuses exclusively on project management. On the other hand, Notion focuses on note-taking, creativity and organization, as well as project management. And since Notion even supports Trello integration, you don’t need to choose between one or the other.
Trello and Notion both have free basic plans, plus subscription-based paid plans with more extensive functionality.
Put Notion in Motion for Peak Organization
There are plenty of project management and productivity apps on the market, but not many of them can make organization fun. Notion is one of the few that can, and creative types will soon discover that they can make notes, documents and even entire wikis as beautiful as they are informative.
So if you’re ready to get organized in style, Notion might just be the software for you.

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