How-To

How to Turn Off Quick Note on Mac

By Adam Davidson

Published September 17, 2023

Want to hide the Quick Notes feature on your Mac? This guide will explain the steps you’ll need to follow.

Your Mac has some really useful features that are designed to make your life easier. You can use the Freeform app for your brainstorming sessions, or use Mac shortcuts to automate your most frequent tasks. You can even quickly open a note to jot down some ideas that you don’t want to forget, using the Quick Note feature.

Sometimes, however, this feature can become more of a hindrance than a help. You may find that you keep opening Quick Notes without meaning to. This’ll interrupt your workflow and get in the way of enjoying the latest episode of your favorite show.

If you’re tired of notes popping up all over your Mac when you don’t want them, then here’s how to turn off Quick Note on your Mac.

What is Quick Note on Mac?

Quick Note is a feature that first appeared in macOS Monterey. It allows you to quickly jot down notes by providing a faster way to open a note than simply launching the Notes app.

This means that you can take note of something as soon as you think of it, just by moving your cursor to the appropriate part of the screen.

How to Use Quick Note on Mac

You can open a Quick Note using the Hot Corners feature on your Mac. By default, Quick Note is set to the bottom right corner of your screen.

To open a Quick Note on your Mac:

1. Move your mouse to the very bottom right corner of your screen.
2. You’ll see the corner of a note appear.
   
3. Click the note—your Quick Note will pop up.
   
4. Enter anything you’d like in your Quick Note. When you’re done, simply close it—the changes will save automatically. Even if you don’t close the current Quick Note, you can still return to it by moving your cursor to the bottom right corner.

How to Open a New Quick Note Each Time

By default, the same Quick Note will open each time you move your mouse to the bottom right corner of the screen, allowing you to add more and more information to the note. However, you may prefer to create a new note each time, to keep your ideas or information separate.

To open a new Quick Note each time on Mac:

1. Open the Notes app.
2. In the menu bar, click Notes.
   
3. Select Settings.
   
4. Uncheck Always Resume to Last Quick Note.
   
5. You’ll now create a new Quick Note each time you move your cursor to the bottom right corner.

How to Turn Off Quick Note on Mac

If you find that you keep accidentally opening a Quick Note when using your Mac, you can turn the feature off. This means that even when your cursor is in the bottom right-hand corner of the screen, the Quick Note won’t appear.

To turn off Quick Notes on your Mac:

1. Click the Apple icon in the menu bar.
   
2. Select System Settings.
   
3. From the left-hand menu, choose Desktop & Dock.
   
4. Scroll to the very bottom of the screen and click the Hot Corners button.
   
5. Click the drop-down for the bottom right corner.
   
6. Select the Dash option at the very bottom.
   
7. Click Done.
   
8. Quick Note will no longer appear when you move the cursor to the bottom right corner of your screen.

How to Add a Hotkey for Quick Note

If you want to use Quick Note occasionally, but it keeps popping up more often than you want it to, you can assign an additional hotkey that is required to make a Quick Note appear.

For example, you can change the settings so that you have to hold down the Cmd key when moving your cursor into the bottom right corner for the Quick Note to appear. If you move the cursor to the corner without the hotkey down, Quick Note won’t pop up.

To add a hotkey for Quick Note:

1. Click the Apple logo in the menu bar.
   
2. Click System Settings.
   
3. Select Desktop & Dock from the left-hand menu.
   
4. Scroll to the bottom of the screen and click Hot Corners.
   
5. Select the drop-down for the bottom right corner.
   
6. Before you make your selection, hold down Cmd, Option, Shift, or Ctrl.
7. The options will now change to show the key you’re holding down in front of the hot corner options.
8. Select the Quick Note option which will now have your selected hotkey in front of it, and then click Done.
   
9. Now Quick Note will only appear if you hold down your selected hotkey before you move your cursor to the bottom right corner.
10. If your cursor is already in the bottom right corner, holding down the hotkey won’t make a Quick Note appear; you need to hold it down before you move the cursor to the corner.

Being Productive On Your Mac

Knowing how to turn off Quick Note on Mac ensures that you don’t keep accidentally opening Quick Notes when you don’t want them. You can opt to turn off Quick Notes completely or add a hotkey so that Quick Notes won’t pop up by accident.

There are plenty of other great features on your Mac that you can take advantage of. You can learn how to use dictation on a Mac to save typing all the time. You can learn how to use Stage Manager on Mac to quickly switch between apps. And you can even get more productive by making use of some of the best Mac productivity apps.