Let’s talk about the OG Evernote app: desktop. Our founder’s vision to help you remember everything started here, even before Evernote’s ‘official’ birth in 2008. And nothing stops us from updating and enhancing it every chance we get. If you’re looking for a feature set that enables you to focus better and get more done, look no further than your desktop or laptop.

(Mild disclaimer: Some features are only available with certain Evernote plans. If you see something you like that’s not in your plan, consider upgrading and giving your productivity a(nother) boost.)

Customizable desktop notifications 

We all get swamped and lose track of details or deadlines from time to time. Fortunately, there’s a simple remedy for that. Setting up automated reminders is a useful way to surface those important notes, meetings, and to-dos. That’s why Evernote offers a bunch of them, including:

• Note reminders: friendly nudges to revisit any note at a time or date of your choosing
• Task reminders: helpful memory jogs to finish uncompleted tasks
• Calendar notifications: reminders of upcoming events, as well as reminders to take notes or review them afterward
• Work Chat messages: notifications for when someone shares a note with you in Evernote

Calendar integration

Connecting Evernote and Google Calendar is all it takes to become a meeting MVP. It enables you to link notes to events, making them more useful and easy to find. Now, meeting prep is just easier, whether you do it in advance or on the spot.

By linking the two, Evernote will automatically send you a notification just before your next meeting. Click that notification and it’ll spawn a preformatted meeting note that automatically fills in details from your calendar, like name, date, attendees, and spaces for notes and action items. Or, you can prepare for the meeting in advance by linking existing notes to your event. Evernote can even remind you to open or create a note before or immediately after an event. Whichever option you use, you’ll have all your relevant info in one place, ready to go. 

Calendar and task reminders

Task reminders allow you to set a specific date and time to receive a reminder notification. You can add up to five reminders to an individual task. When you add a reminder to a task, you’ll receive an in-app notification at the date and time you specify (if you have notifications enabled).

When you have Evernote and Google Calendar connected, Evernote can remind you when it’s time to take meeting notes, or open an existing note, so you never miss a detail.

Calendar notifications give you a prompt shortly before your meetings, at the moment they start, or right after they end, so you’ll never forget to take notes or need to hunt down material you’ve prepared in advance.

Evernote Helper and quick notes

This one’s a serious Evernote desktop power tip. With Evernote Helper, you can create quick notes or save screenshots even when Evernote is in the background. Just click the Evernote icon in your menu bar (Mac) or system tray (Windows) and you can:

• Write a quick note
• Capture a screenshot
• Switch between multiple accounts
• Open the full Evernote app

Seamless handoff to other devices 

Create a note in Evernote and it automatically syncs to every device where your Evernote account lives—desktop, web, and mobile. You can hand off your notes from one platform to the other as you go through your day.

Customize Home

When you customize your Home, you put the information you need front and center, so you can see exactly what you want, looking just the way you like it. Depending on which subscription you have, your customization options include:

• Changing or removing the background image
• Adding, removing, and reordering widgets
• Resizing widgets
• Seeing exactly the notes you want on Home with the filtered notes widget
• Adding multiple copies of some widgets (Professional and Teams only)
• Changing the scratch pad color and title

Customizable keyboard shortcuts

Get to your favorite Evernote features, faster. These keyboard shortcuts allow you to trigger certain Evernote functions by using a special key combination on your keyboard. And while there are dozens of these you can use inside the app, there are five more that are global, i.e. you can use them even when Evernote is in the background. 

•  Call up a new note window
•  Paste to Evernote
•  Search in Evernote
•  Open Evernote Helper
•  Capture screen

All shortcuts, global or otherwise, are customizable, so you can map them to your preferred key combos. You can pull up a complete list by typing Cmd + / or Ctrl + / in the app.

Linkify copy/paste

This one saves you a step whenever you want to add a link into note text. Simply copy a URL, highlight the text in your note you want to link, select “Paste,” and voila—link added. 

Not a big Desktop user? Stay tuned. 

In this “Parade of Features” series, we’re covering killer features on our iOS, Android, web, and tablet apps as well. So if you’re not a Desktop user, don’t worry. We’ve got you covered. 

Did we miss your favorite Desktop feature? Reach out to us on Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn, or Facebook and let us know!