How to Build a Better Note-Taking System With Colors

How do you differentiate one set of notes from another? If your chemistry and politics notes look the same, your brain won’t be able to compartmentalize the information and store it in the right folder. 

If everyone were satisfied with black pens, there would be no such thing as studygram. Black text is flat and difficult to skim, making it a boring experience for your eyes, brain, and attention span.

One of the solutions is to create a colorful note-taking system. Colors engage the senses, capturing your attention, engaging your brain, and getting those neurons firing. In short, setting up a colorful note-taking system can turn a snooze fest into a satisfying revision session. 

And once you’ve learned how to leverage the power of color, you can use it in all walks of life. This psychological hack isn’t innate to students; creatives, professors, and professionals in the corporate world can use the tips and tricks in this article to remember more information in less time. 

Just a quick note: this article is geared toward digital notetakers, specifically those who use iPads. iPads have tons of brilliant note-taking apps, like Goodnotes, Notability, and Freeform, so there’s no limit to your creativity. 

Why color-coding works 

The psychology of color is an interesting one.

One study looked into the impact of colors on recall rates among students. It focused on chromatic (red, blue, green) and achromatic (black, white, gray) colors and tested both congruent and incongruent chromatic colors. 

Good to know: Congruent colors align with the context of the word; for example, if the word “red” is written in red ink, it’s a congruent color. 

Unsurprisingly, the study found that students who learned using chromatic colors had a significantly higher recall rate. Not only that, but congruent chromatic colors came out on top. 

Another study, which was written by a teacher and student duo, came to an interesting conclusion about gender-specific colorful note-taking systems. As expected, it found that “color has a more positive influence than normal black and white text in regards to retaining information.” It also found that women performed significantly better on the sample with plain black ink overlaid with colorful highlighters, whereas men performed better on the sample with colored text. 

There’s plenty of anecdotal evidence out there, too. For instance, here’s a YouTuber explaining why engineers should take colored notes. Interesting stuff! 

We can reasonably conclude that colors, and by extension, colorful note-taking systems, have a big impact on information retention, categorization, and recall. 

So, whether you’ve got your sights set on a physics final or the next big board meeting, color can have a big impact on your goals. Let’s jump into the dos and don’ts of creating colorful note-taking systems — future you will thank you. 

What you’ll need to get started 

Like we mentioned before, we’ve honed in on digital note-taking. In other words, a pencil and a notepad aren’t gonna cut it. 

The digital alternative might seem pricey, but all the tools we’ve listed below are multi-functional and will pay dividends for years to come. 

Here’s all the equipment you need to start taking colorful notes. 

An iPad and Apple Pencil (or stylus of your choice) 

You don’t have to have an iPad to create a colorful note-taking system… but it definitely helps. If you ask us, we prefer iPads over anything else.

Essentially, iPads are a one-stop shop for digital note-taking. They have excellent note-taking apps — more on that later — and also double as entertainment hubs. 

To complete your Apple bundle, you need a stylus. We recommend buying an Apple Pencil 2 or Apple Pencil Pro. They have a bunch of effective features that are designed to improve your digital workflow, whether it focuses on note-taking or graphic design. 

Here are a few of the benefits: 

• Haptic feedback: The Apple Pencil Pro delivers small vibrations any time you switch tools or complete actions, heightening your note-taking experience. 
• Low latency: Minimal delay between input and response. 
• Palm rejection: Rest your palm on your iPad screen without creating unwanted marks. 
• Pressure sensitivity: Alter your pressure inputs to create varying thicknesses. 
• Squeeze gesture: Activate a customizable tool palette with a squeeze. 

You can opt for an off-brand stylus that’s compatible with your iPad. But we think it’s fair to say that Apple Pencils are the best option for a truly cohesive digital writing experience on iPads. 

Good to know: Both the Apple Pencil 2 and Apple Pencil Pro cost $129, so you can buy the most advanced version without spending any extra. 

Rock Paper Pencil for a pen-on-paper note-taking experience 

We recommend buying an iPad and Apple Pencil, but the truth is, they’re not without fault. 

Colorful note-taking systems aside, you need to smooth out the transition from pen-on-paper to iPad and stylus. Plenty of people struggle with this, no matter which tablet they use. 

An iPad’s sleek screen just isn’t comparable to a piece of paper, which can lead to hiccups in your note-taking process. 

To solve this problem, digital notetakers all over the world use matte screen protectors. But don’t rush to Amazon just yet — there are loads of iPad screen protectors out there, and only a few really commit to improving your digital note-taking experience. 

Rock Paper Pencil is our pick. It’s the only matte screen protector for iPads on the market that includes both a screen protector and Apple Pencil replacement tips. Other iPad accessories only include the matte screen protector, which doesn’t address the full scale of the problem. 

Here’s what you need to know about Rock Paper Pencil. 

• Matte screen protector: Features textured nodes that replicate the friction and drag of a piece of paper. 
• Apple Pencil replacement tips: 1mm stainless steel ballpoint tips. They’re the optimal size for accuracy and control, mirroring the familiar feel of a ballpoint pen.

Did we mention that Rock Paper Pencil is reusable? Installing the screen is as easy as just placing it on your iPad, and once you’re finished, you can simply peel it off and keep it safe for next time. 

Perfect for students: If you’re a student, Rock Paper Pencil is just that much better. They offer a 33% discount to any student who uses this link. All you need to do is give a valid student ID or email.

Good to know: Even with the best matte screen protector in the world, plenty of digital notetakers struggle to replicate their handwriting in the digital realm. And let’s face it, a lot of us have worked hard to develop a handwriting style that we like looking at. In an effort to translate all that hard work to digital notes, we’ve banged our heads together and thought of 8 ways to make handwriting look better on iPad. 

Compatible note-taking apps 

Before you can set up a colorful note-taking system, you need to find a note-taking app. The good news is that there are loads to choose from, with a few specific apps rising to the top of our list.  

All these apps allow for color customization and are very highly rated in the digital note-taking community. 

• Goodnotes
• Notability 
• Apple Notes 
• LiquidText
• Evernote

Looking for a more in-depth overview of all the potential note-taking apps for iPad? We’ve got you covered — and we’ve also created a detailed rundown of Goodnotes vs. Notability.  

Pre-made and custom templates 

Templates are a great way to streamline your note-taking session. You can either: 

1. Purchase a premade note-taking template from sites like Etsy 
2. Create your own templates 
3. Use the templates in your note-taking app 

There are benefits to all these options, but for today, we’re looking at the templates built into Goodnotes. 

Goodnotes has all the basics you could wish for, as well as a few more complex and targeted note-taking options. 

We’ve opted for this template, which is based on the Cornell note-taking method. Invented by Walter Pauk in the 1950s, it’s designed to help students take effective, efficient notes. 

It’s simple enough. The title goes at the top, terms go in the left column, general notes in the biggest space, and the bottom panel is reserved for a summary of the topic. 

How to use colors

We all know that there is more to colors than just primary colors like red, yellow, and blue. 

To create colorful note-taking systems, you need to understand context. Colors and their contexts are wide and varied, and massively reliant on your personal associations. For a literature student, red might signify betrayal, murder, manipulation, and budding romance. For a politics student, red is the color of the Republican Party. It all depends on the context!

In this example, we’ve taken advantage of some easy associations to elevate our colorful note-taking system. In this context, it makes sense to write “light” in yellow and highlight all of the associated words in yellow, too. And by adding a yellow light bulb, we’ve created yet another link between concept and color. 

Step-by-step: Setting up a colorful note-taking system 

To give you real insights into the step-by-step process, we’re going to set up a colorful note-taking system using Goodnotes.

1. Choose your categories 

To start, you need to decide how you’ll categorize content and colors. You can assign colors by: 

• Classes: Each class gets a different color, e.g. biology is blue, maths is red, etc. 
• Topics: Each topic (within a larger subject like maths) gets its own color, e.g. fractions are orange, geometry is purple, etc. 
• Structure: Highlight headings and underline important content. 

One of our favorite ways to establish a colorful note-taking system is to assign colors to different types of information. In this example, we’ve used yellow for key terms, blue for questions, and red for examples.

We’ve included a color key on the side. We recommend using the same key for the same subject, so that your brain will automatically associate specific colors with terms, examples, or questions.

1. Assign consistent colors 

It’s all well and good implementing a colorful note-taking system, but there’s not much point in creating a different system for each page of notes. You just won’t remember the colors and what they mean. 

We recommend using three to five colors and staying consistent with them. So, if your key terms in maths are yellow, all your key terms across the board should also be yellow. 

You may want to create a color key to keep track of your colors. To streamline the process, Goodnotes users can screenshot an existing color key to transform it into a picture, import the picture into their next note, and then save it as a Sticker for even quicker access next time around.  

2.  Set up digital tools to match 

Almost all note-taking apps on iPad have the ability to create a colorful note-taking system. But, to really supercharge your note-taking sessions, you need to personalize your color palette.

Color pickers are pretty common, so you shouldn’t have a problem finding one on any note-taking app worth its salt. 

Here’s how to find the color picker in Goodnotes:

1. Tap the pen tool
2. Tap one of the color slots twice to open the customization options 

From there, you can choose a color from the wheel, paste a HEX code in the color preset field, or use the color dropper tool to sample a color from your screen. 

4. Create your own templates 

We’ve mentioned it a dozen times, but it’s worth repeating: personalization is key. The more unique your colorful note-taking system, the more likely you are to remember important information. 

You can make your notes unique and organized by creating your own templates. The easiest way to do this is to build your page with whatever presets work for you — for example, a blank color key, titles, sections for questions and examples, etc — and duplicate the page to turn it into a template. 

Most note-taking apps allow you to save your creations as templates. But in Goodnotes, you can only save imported PDFs as templates. 

Here’s how to do it:

1. Use an external app to create your template, e.g. Procreate, Canva, etc 
2. Save your design as a PDF file 
3. Open Goodnotes and tap the gear icon in the top right-hand corner 
4. Select Notebook templates 
5. Tap the + icon to create a new category 
6. Tap import and select your template 

Now, whenever you create a new notebook, you can select the custom template you’ve imported. It’s simple enough, and you can focus on creating colorful notes.  

Examples of colorful note-taking systems 

Don’t worry, we wouldn’t leave you without a few ideas to get you started. 

Start simple

Before you create a color palette with 8,000 different hues, you might want to consider a simpler approach. 

For beginners, we recommend a maximum of three colors. That’s one color for headings, one for key terms, and one for examples. It’s by no means the most exhaustive, colorful note-taking system out there, but it’s a gentle introduction to the world of efficient note-taking. 

Of course, you can change this to suit your preferences. You could highlight bullet points instead of headings or, if you believe in the gender-divide we mentioned earlier, you might prefer colored digital ink over highlighters. 

Brighten up your shortcuts 

Over time, you’ll develop shortcuts for your notes. This looks different for everyone. 

Some people use mnemonics to remember key bits of information, for instance, a biology student might use “MRS GREN” to recall the characteristics of living things. You can use a different color for each letter or highlight the entire word green to give yourself a context clue. 

Add colorful context clues

That’s another thing — context clues are great for very specific notes. For example, you might use red to highlight the murder weapon in your notes on Of Mice and Men. Red symbolizes murder, and by highlighting the murder weapon itself (either the word or a doodle), you can create quick associations between the two, vastly improving your recall. 

Plenty of people create bullet points to draw their attention to important bits of data, whether it be statistics, quotes, or historical facts. But there’s no need to stick to the typical circle. Instead, why not try stars? Or DNA spirals for biology notes? You can customize these context cues to suit every subject. 

Tips and tricks 

We’ve got some tried and tested tips and tricks to get your colorful note-taking system started. 

• Accentuate: Use tags, stickers, and digital washi tape to make your notes more eye-catching. 
• Use color keys: Always create a color key before you start. You can make this easier for yourself by saving a plain color key as a template or photo. 
• Be consistent: Assign specific colors to terms, examples, and quotes, and use the same colors throughout your notes — even across subjects. 
• Maintain clarity: Remember, color should add clarity, not clutter. Don’t overdo it with thousands of different colors, and don’t highlight every line. 
• Create flashcards: Transfer your colorful note-taking system to flashcards. For example, if you highlight examples in green, you could write examples on green flashcards. 

Final thoughts 

Color can transform bland, boring notes into effective revision devices. And not just for students — professionals and creatives can take a leaf out of this book too. At the end of the day, it’s all about the psychological power of color. 

The good news is that the best color coding systems are usually the simplest. So, if you’re raring to go, start out with a three-pronged color-coding system that prioritizes the most important parts of your notes. 

For the most satisfying digital writing experience, try Rock Paper Pencil. It’s the only iPad accessory that comes with a matte screen protector and Apple Pencil replacement tips. They work in harmony to create the most realistic, recognizable pencil-on-paper experience possible. 

Psst… Looking for more of the best tech accessories and gadgets for students? And if you’re a productivity fiend, you might like our article on the 11 must-have iPad apps for college students.