Backing up and restoring notes from the Notes app on Catalina?

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Backing up and restoring notes from the Notes app on Catalina?

Hi,

In searching here and elsewhere on the Internet I can only find antiquated responses or iPhone-specific feedback to similar questions. Hopefully you can provide a Mac-specific answer to this question:

How do I back up and restore my notes from the Apple Notes app held on my iMac?

I have iCloud enabled for Notes among other things but of course this is NOT a backup. It's a syncing service and so, if I accidentally delete notes on my iMac then that mistake is reflected more or less instantly in iCloud. A backup is a snapshot that, once taken, does not response to changes in the contents of your computer. Very handy if you only notice a corruption or mistake later.

I have my iMac backing up to Time Machine and have only excluded sensible directories so hopefully any local database of notes is being backed up already:

If that is correct then I guess my remaining question is how would I restore a Time Machine backup of the Notes app's contents from (for example) yesterday?

If it helps, I'm using a 5K iMac with macOS Catalina 10.15.4.

Thanks for taking a look at my question and if I have somehow missed an answer elsewhere, please do just point me in the right direction.

Andy

iMac Line (2012 and Later)

Posted on May 10, 2020 1:00 PM

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Answer 1

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sberman

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May 10, 2020 3:22 PM in response to TheStoat

TheStoat wrote:

Are you saying the only recovery possible for lost data is if I accidentally delete a note and realise before 30 days have elapsed?

Yes.

Surely if you haven’t missed an accidentally deleted note for 30 days, there was no harm in deleting it.

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Answer 2

sberman

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May 10, 2020 1:20 PM in response to TheStoat

TheStoat wrote:

I have iCloud enabled for Notes among other things but of course this is NOT a backup.

This is the key point in your post. I’m glad you mentioned where your notes are housed.

First of all, these notes are not saved in a backup.

However, when you delete an iCloud note, what actually happens is the note is saved for 30 days in the “Recently Deleted” folder in iCloud Notes.

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Answer 3

TheStoat Author

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May 10, 2020 3:19 PM in response to sberman

Thanks for that. Are you saying the only recovery possible for lost data is if I accidentally delete a note and realise before 30 days have elapsed? Is there no way to export notes en masse from the Notes app then? Perhaps this would be another way of backing up. I looked into this but can only seem to export individual notes, even if I select all notes in the All iCloud folder first and then use the Export option on the File menu.

In the past I have accidentally replaced text in notes (due to pilot error on a touch screen) and that would not be recoverable using the Recently Deleted folder. Also, if I miss the 30 days recovery deadline I would seem to be equally out of luck. It's this sort of scenario I'd ideally like to guard against.

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Answer 4

TheStoat Author

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May 10, 2020 3:35 PM in response to sberman

That’s really not how reference materials work. If we’re talking about a daily schedule or To Do list then of course, that would be noticed the same day, maybe the day after. When you’re recording data for review at a later date, perhaps noting information for a future project then it may be some time before you revisit them.

Thank you for the clarification though. Notes have evolved significantly but aren’t quite the free, built-in replacement for other note taking apps we might wish for. I love keeping my data within the Apple ecosystem where possible but in this case I’ll need to find an alternative. It’s good to know I haven’t somehow missed an export or backup trick.

Thanks again,

Andy

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Answer 5

sberman

Level 10

268,359 points

May 10, 2020 4:00 PM in response to TheStoat

I’m glad all that helped.

One of your remarks above did catch my eye.

TheStoat wrote:

When you’re recording data for review at a later date, perhaps noting information for a future project then it may be some time before you revisit them.

Given this use of the Notes app, I would think extraordinary prerequisites would be required before deleting a note.

Anyway, I’m glad it’s all cleared up.

Enjoy your Apple gear!

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Backing up and restoring notes from the Notes app on Catalina?

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