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Notebook Capture — Support

Help for Notebook Capture, the private notebook for iPhone, iPad and Mac that collects text, screenshots, photos and files and exports what matters.

Last updated October 17, 2026

1. Getting help

E-mail info@chinguettilabs.com with the app version (Settings → About), your device and OS version, and what happened. Please do not send notebook contents or backup files by e-mail. We usually reply within two business days.

2. Getting started

  • Notebooks and notes: the first screen lists your notebooks. Tap + to add one, open it, then tap the compose button to add a note. Swipe a note or notebook to rename or delete it; press and hold for more options (duplicate, move to another notebook).
  • Blocks: a note is made of blocks. Use the bar at the bottom of a note to add text, a heading, a checklist, a callout, a divider, a photo or (on iPad) an Apple Pencil drawing. Tap ⋯ on a block to change its style, move it or delete it. The formatting bar appears when you are editing a text block.
  • Capture: tap the capture button (viewfinder) in a note. Add a photo from the camera, Photos or Files, or paste from the clipboard. Text in the image is recognized on the device and placed in the text field, where you can edit it. Drag on the image to keep only part of it, choose the destination notebook and note, then tap Insert. On Mac, Select Screen Area captures any part of your screen.
  • Share sheet: in Safari or any app, tap Share → Notebook Capture, pick a notebook, Save. The clip appears as a new note the next time you open the app, with the page title and link kept as its source.
  • Scan, voice, link: in Capture, Scan uses the document camera (multi-page, auto-cropped), Voice records a note and transcribes it on the device, Link clips a web page you paste.
  • Search: use the search field on the Notebooks screen. Type #tag to search tags. When nothing matches literally, the app also looks for notes with a similar meaning, on-device.
  • Pins, tags, Recent Captures: pin a note (swipe right or the Pin chip under the title), add tags with the Tag chip, and open Recent Captures at the top of the Notebooks list to see everything captured in the last seven days across notebooks.
  • Widgets and Control Center: add the Notebook Capture widget to your Home or Lock Screen, or the Capture control to Control Center, for one-tap capture.

2b. Summaries, titles and action items

Open a note → ⋯ → Summarize Note, Suggest Title or Extract Action Items. On devices with Apple Intelligence these use Apple’s on-device language model; elsewhere a simpler on-device method is used. Review the result before relying on it.

3. Export, print and share

Open a note → ⋯ → Export PDF… to preview the document, choose paper size, orientation, cover page and footer, then save or share it. Export as Markdown… saves a folder with the note as Markdown and its images, ready for Obsidian, Bear or GitHub. Print… sends it to AirPrint. Share as Text copies the note as Markdown-style text to any app. From a notebook’s ⋯ menu, Export Notebook as PDF… makes one PDF of every note, and Share Notebook Package… creates a .barronotebook file (optionally password-protected) that another Notebook Capture user can import from the Notebooks screen or by opening the file.

4. Protected notebooks

Open a notebook → ⋯ → Protect Notebook…. Choose a password of at least 12 characters with upper and lower case letters, a number and a symbol, and optionally allow Face ID, Touch ID or Optic ID. Protected notebooks lock again when the app goes to the background. There is no password recovery: if you lose the password and biometric unlock is off, the notebook cannot be opened.

5. Backup, restore and iCloud

Settings → Backup & Storage → Create Full Backup… saves one file with all notebooks and settings; turn on Encrypt backups with a password first if the file will leave your device. Restore from Backup… replaces the current data with a backup and makes a safety copy first. Protected notebooks must be unlocked when the backup is made; restored on a different device they are unlocked, because their keys never leave the original device. If Store library in iCloud Drive is shown, turning it on moves the library into your iCloud Drive so your other devices can open the same notebooks.

6. Text recognition

Recognition runs entirely on your device with Apple Vision; nothing is uploaded. If no text is found, make sure the image is sharp and the text is readable, or crop to the part that contains text and tap Recognize Text in Selection. You can turn recognition off in Settings → Capture.

7. Your data

Everything stays on your device unless you export, print, share or back it up. Delete blocks, notes or notebooks in the app, or delete the app to remove everything. See the Privacy Policy.