Intro to workspaces

Intro to workspaces - hero
In this Article

Everything you do in Notion takes place in a workspace. It's your virtual home to organize information and create exactly the way you want — as just one person, together as a team, or across a whole company. Expand, edit, and mold it to fit your needs 🏠

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Your Notion app interface is split into two sections: the sidebar and the editor.

1. Sidebar

  • Notion's expandable sidebar is your navigation system.

  • All the pages and databases you create will appear here.

  • You can nest pages inside each other for infinite levels of organization.

  • It's also home to your settings, trash, and other tools.

2. Editor

  • This is where all the content you create lives.

  • Control menus are at the top (we'll go through those in more detail), but otherwise, Notion's editor is a blank canvas for you to write, plan, brainstorm, etc.

  • You'll notice that as soon as you start typing in this space, those top menus fade into the background, leaving you with your thoughts in a spacious zone of focus.

Control panel

The control panel at the top of your sidebar contains several key features:

  • Workspace switcher: Click on your current workspace's name to switch between the workspaces you belong to, create a new one, join another one, or log out. Learn more about switching workspaces here →

  • Search: Click to open Notion's search window, where you can either type in what you're looking for or quickly jump to a recently visited page. Learn more about Search here →

  • Home: Click to see the pages and tasks that need your attention. Learn more about Home here →

  • Inbox: Click to see all your notifications in one place. This menu combines revisions that were made on pages you follow, mentions of you across your workspace, and new work assignments. A red notification badge will appear here when you have unread notifications. Learn more about inbox here →

  • Settings & members: Click to open settings for your account information, workspace, payment plan, and billing information. Learn more about account settings here →

Teamspace pages

Teamspaces are a dedicated area for every team within your organization or company, and can be customized on an individual basis. Learn more about teamspaces →

  • Every workspace has at least one default teamspace, which all members will see in their sidebar.

  • Any of the pages in default teamspaces in your sidebar can be seen and shared by the other members of the workspace.

In the Teamspaces section, you'll also see any other teamspaces that you are a member of.

  • Click the name of any teamspace to reveal or hide its nested pages.

  • Keep your sidebar clean by leaving any teamspaces you don't need to access. Hover over the teamspace name and click the ••• button, then Leave teamspace.

Tip: Click on the name of any sidebar section - Workspace, Shared, Private - to collapse it! Keeps your sidebar nice and clean ✨

Nested pages

  • You can open up any sidebar toggle to reveal pages nested inside pages. We often call nested pages subpages.

  • For database pages, you can open the toggle to see all the different views you've created of that database. These are represented with a  next to them, such as under Team Tasks above.

Shared pages

  • Any pages that you've shared with only select individuals will appear under Shared.

  • You'll see this category in your sidebar as soon as you invite someone to join a private page.

  • Other members of your workspace who haven't been invited can't view these pages. This is helpful for one-on-one meeting notes, for instance.

  • If you want to remove a page from Shared without deleting it, hover over it, click ••• and then Leave.

Private pages

  • Every user's workspace comes with a Private section for their own pages. Anything you add here can't be seen by the people in your workspace.

  • This is useful for your own tasks or notes, or anything you want to work on individually before sharing with others.

Note: If you drag a page from Workspace into Private in your sidebar, everyone else will lose access.

Templates, import & trash

  • Templates opens our template picker, where you can create a new page using starter content to help you accomplish any one of 50+ jobs.

  • Import lets you add data from a number of other apps into your Notion workspace. We make it easy for you to move content over from Evernote, Trello, Asana, Word, Google Docs, Dropbox Paper, Quip and more.

  • Trash contains all the pages you delete. You can drag and drop them in here. You can also click on trash to search, view and restore these pages.

Favorites

  • Favorites is where you can pin pages you need to access quickly to the top of your sidebar.

  • This section will appear when you favorite your first page by clicking the star icon at the top right.

Tip: Favorites are helpful for stashing pages relevant to your current projects. You can easily add or remove them as your workflow and priorities change.

Create a new page

  • Click the + New page button at the bottom of your sidebar to create a new page.

  • Or, click on any + button in the sidebar next to a workspace to add a page to a particular section.

Tip: You can use the shortcut cmd/ctrl + N to create a new page at any time.

Hover options

  • When you hover over a page in your sidebar, you'll see both a + button to add a page nested inside it, and a ••• icon, which opens a menu of actions you can apply to the page: DeleteDuplicateCopy LinkRename, and Move to.

  • Always know where you are in respect to your page structure. See how the page you're currently looking at fits into other pages.

  • You can click on any page in this breadcrumb to immediately jump to it. Sometimes this will be abridged with a ... — click that to see or go to all the pages in between.

Collaborators

  • You can see the profile photos of everyone else who has access to the page you're on (sometimes this gets abridged to a notation like +16 others). If you hover over any of them, you can see the full list, their names, and email addresses.

  • Greyed out avatars are people who are not currently viewing the page but have access to it.

  • When you collaborate in real-time on the same content, you can see people's photos moving around, corresponding to the block they're reading or editing.

Share menu

  • Each row in this menu represents a different person or group of people you can share the page with. In the menu above for this Engineering Wiki page:

    • Share to web is turned off, so only you and your teammates can see this page.

    • Everyone at Acme Inc. means everyone in the workspace can comment on the page.

    • [email protected] is an example guest on the page who was invited from outside the workspace — she can only view the page.

    • Fig is an example of a team member with full access to the page. They'll be able to make edits and invite additional people.

  • The dropdown menus on the right let you set their level of access.

  • Copy link copies the page's unique URL to your clipboard so you can share it with whoever you want. Still, only people with access to the page can see it.

  • Invite lets you add people both inside or outside your workspace to a page using their email address. Learn more about sharing here →

Updates menu

  • Click the 🕘 clock icon to get an overview of all the revisions and comments made on the current page.

  • Click Follow to keep tabs on changes made on the page. You'll see them aggregated across all the pages you follow in the Updates menu in your sidebar.

Favorite

  • Click the 🌟 star icon to pin any page to the top of your sidebar under the heading Favorites.

  • This is especially useful if you want one-click access to pages that you're visiting repeatedly for a project.

  • To remove a favorite page, just hover over it in your sidebar, right click (or click •••) and choose Remove from Favorites.

••• menu

This menu contains many options and actions:

  • Default, Serif, or Mono: Choose from three different typography choices to format your page.

  • Small text: Turn this on to make the type smaller throughout your page.

  • Full width: Turn this on to shrink the right and left margins of the page.

  • Lock page: Turn this on to prevent any edits from being made. This is good for preventing accidental edits on very important pages.

  • Lock database: This option is only available for full-page databases. When you turn this on, people can still enter data, but they can’t change views or properties.

  • Customize page: Toggle the visibility of backlink and page comment sections.

  • Copy link: Copies a link to the page you can share with people who have access.

  • Duplicate

  • Delete

  • Move to: This opens up a menu where you can choose any other workspace or page to move the current page into.

  • Undo: Reverses the action last taken on the page.

  • View edit history: View past versions of the page going back several days, depending on what plan you're on.

  • Recover pages: Opens up Trash so you can restore or permanently remove sub-pages you've deleted.

  • Import or sync from: You can add documents and data from a number of other apps (Evernote, Trello, Google Docs, etc.) to the page.

  • Export: Download the page as a file to your computer. Databases get saved as CSV files, while non-database pages get saved as Markdown files. You can also export your page or database as PDF or HTML.

  • Merge with CSV

  • Connect to

  • Word count

  • Last edited

Help & support

  • Click the ? icon at the bottom right of the window to open Help & Support options.

  • Help & support documentation: Will take you to the Help Center you're reading right now 🤓

  • Message support: Lets you send a message directly to our support team from the app.

  • Chat with sales: Ready to upgrade to Plus, Business, or Enterprise? Let us know!

  • Keyboard shortcuts: A shortcut to seeing all our keyboard and Markdown shortcuts.

  • What's new?: Release notes for features we've launched, and a peek at upcoming features.

  • Join us: Job openings at Notion — we're always hiring!

One last reminder that a workspace operates slightly differently if you're using it with a team than if you're using it on your own:

  • Personal workspaces default to keeping pages private unless they're explicitly shared.

  • On a team, any page under the Workspace heading of your sidebar can be seen and most likely edited by all members of your workspace (unless otherwise specified).

  • Sidebar organization under Workspace is also viewable by all members. The page arrangement will look the same to everyone, although individuals can toggle different pages open or closed without affecting everyone's view.

  • On Notion's Plus, Business, or Enterprise Plan, there are members and admins with different levels of permission. Learn more about sharing and permissions here →


FAQs

Can I switch between workspaces that are associated with different email addresses?

To add your workspaces from another email account, use the Add another account button in the workspace switcher at the top left of your Notion window, and follow the steps to login to your other account. More on this here →

I clicked the Create or Join Workspace button, but it will only let me create a workspace. How do I join a workspace?

You can only join a workspace via the Create or Join Workspace button if that workspace has the Allowed Email Domains setting enabled, which lets users with your email domain join the workspace automatically.

To join a workspace, you'll need to ask an admin from that workspace to send you an invite.

To add your workspaces from another email account, use the Add another account button in the workspace switcher at the top left of your Notion window, and follow the steps to login to your other account. More on this here →

My sidebar doesn't have any sections. How do I turn those on?

The sidebar sections reflect the sharing settings of your account. If you have more than one person in your workspace, a Workspace section appears in the sidebar for your collaborative work with that person, and the Private section is there for your personal pages that are only visible to you. That said, you can enable these sections manually by clicking Share at the top right of any page, and turning on the Workspace Access switch.

When I subscribe to a Plus Plan, does it cover all my workspaces?

Paid plans only apply to one workspace, and don't cover the whole account. Workspaces are completely separate, so you won't be able to link any content between them.

We recommend using the least number of workspaces possible, and taking advantage of top-level pages in your sidebar to stay organized.

How can I migrate all my Notion content to a different workspace?

Note: Any migrated content will be duplicated to the new workspace and these pages sometimes have issues. For more information, click here.

To move your content from one workspace to another associated with the same account, click ••• next to each of the top-level pages in your sidebar (or right click) and select Move To. You'll see the option to move them to another workspace.

When you move top-level pages, all their sub-pages go with them. They'll appear in the Private section but can be moved wherever you want to put them.

What if I accidentally deleted something permanently? Any way to get it back?

If you accidentally delete a page, a workspace, or even your entire account, we can help! Accidents happen 😅 Just send us a message in the app by clicking ? at the bottom left on desktop (or in your sidebar on mobile). Or email us at [email protected].

We keep backups of our database, which allows us to restore a snapshot of your content in the past 30 days if you need it.

How do I log out of my Notion account?

Click on your current workspace's name at the very top left of your sidebar. Scroll to the bottom, and you'll see the option to Log Out next to your email address.

On mobile, tap the  icon at the top left, then tap the workspace switcher at the top of that menu. Tap Log Out at the bottom.


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