A useful notes system answers one question quickly: where will I look for this when I need it? Projects work well because they follow the things you are already doing: planning a trip, improving a product, learning a skill or keeping track of a home renovation.
Name projects after real areas of work
Start with a few active projects. Use names you would naturally say aloud, such as “Kitchen renovation” or “Autumn launch”. A folder called “Miscellaneous ideas 2” does not give you much help when you come back a month later.
Keep similar work together at first. Split a project when the notes have become hard to navigate or when the sharing boundary is different. You do not need to predict every future category before capturing your first thought.
Capture first, review the destination second
When an idea arrives, write or speak it before it disappears. In Thoughts AI, on-device organising assistance can help find a suitable project. You still decide where the note belongs and can move it when another destination makes more sense.
Give the note enough context to stand on its own. “Ask about the timeline” is ambiguous. “Ask the kitchen contractor when the cabinets arrive” carries the information you will need later, even if it starts in Unfiled.
Use Unfiled as an inbox
Unfiled is useful for thoughts you have captured but have not placed yet. Review it at a time that fits your routine, such as before planning the next day. Move notes into an existing project, create a project when there is a real new area of work, or remove items you no longer need.
Do not turn the review into a requirement for capturing. A note in Unfiled is still better than an idea you never wrote down. The review exists to help you recover context, not to achieve a permanently empty inbox.
Make shared projects deliberate
A personal project and a shared project may cover similar subjects but have different audiences. Before enabling sync or inviting a collaborator, check the content already inside. Keep private background notes in a separate local project when they do not belong in the shared work.
Thoughts lets you choose which projects to sync. Read the privacy policy if you are deciding where personal or collaborative content should live. Access to a project is a practical sharing choice, not just an organisational label.
Review projects at the moment they become useful
Before a planning session, open the project and scan what has changed. Before speaking to a contractor, review that project’s recent notes. Connect the review to the work itself so the notes become useful inputs rather than another collection to maintain.
A good starting structure is small: a handful of active projects and one inbox for everything undecided. Let the structure change as your work changes. If spoken capture is part of your routine, follow the voice note workflow to make those ideas easier to file and find.