How to Back Up Sticky Notes on Your Mac
Choose Where Your Notes Live
When the pad asks “Where should your notes live?”, click “Create a “Peel & Stick Notes” folder” or “Use a folder I already have”. Picked “Not Now”? “Open Vault” in the menu bar offers the same choice, and the pad asks again the next time Peel & Stick starts.
Approve the Folder
In the panel, pick where the new “Peel & Stick Notes” folder should go, or pick your own folder, then click “Choose Folder…”. Peel & Stick gets access to that one folder only, and in it touches only its own notes.
Look in the Folder
In Finder, each unlocked note is one .pstick file named after its first line. Notes you wrote earlier appear once you edit them or quit Peel & Stick.
Back Up as Usual
Time Machine, or any backup that includes the folder, now covers your unlocked notes. Time Machine also backs up locked notes, in Peel & Stick’s own storage.
Carry the Files to a New Mac
On the new Mac, choose a notes folder and put the .pstick files in it. Choose “Quit Peel & Stick” in the menu bar and open Peel & Stick again: it picks the notes up. Or drop a file onto a pad.
Find Any Note
Choose menu bar ▸ “Open Vault”, press ⌘F and type a word from the note.
Where Are Sticky Notes Stored on Mac?
Peel & Stick keeps every note in its own storage on your Mac, and Time Machine includes that storage in its backups. To back up sticky notes on your Mac as files you can see and move, also choose a notes folder: from then on, your unlocked sticky notes are saved as files there too.
Peel & Stick has no server and doesn’t send your notes anywhere. In the folder you find:
- one .pstick file per unlocked note, which Finder shows as a single file
- file names taken from each note’s first line, up to 80 characters; two notes with the same first line get separate files
- inside each file, manifest.json: the whole note as readable text
- no locked notes: they stay in Peel & Stick’s own storage (encoded, not encrypted) and return to the folder when you remove the lock; see how to lock sticky notes on your Mac
Move Sticky Notes to a New Mac
Peel & Stick doesn’t sync notes between Macs, through iCloud or any other way, so you carry the files yourself. Locked notes aren’t in the folder: open each one and choose “Remove the Lock”, and it returns to your folder.
On the new Mac, copy your notes folder across and pick it with “Use a folder I already have”. Keep the files in that folder itself, not in a folder inside it. Peel & Stick looks for new files only when it starts, so quit and reopen it.
To add one note, drop its .pstick file onto a pad. Coming from another app? Drag its text onto a pad: it becomes a fresh sheet. For the sticky-notes app built into macOS, read does a Mac have sticky notes.
Export Sticky Notes on Mac: The Files Are Already There
Peel & Stick has no export command, because your unlocked notes are already files in your notes folder. Each file’s manifest.json is readable text, so your words aren’t trapped in the app. To see it, Control-click the file in Finder and choose “Show Package Contents”.
What Peel & Stick doesn’t do today:
- no export to PDF, picture or plain text
- no printing
- no preview of a note’s contents in Finder
- no opening a .pstick file by double-clicking it
Search All Your Sticky Notes on Mac
Search lives in the Vault, a window that lists your notes under “On your desk”, each with a caption: “On your desktop” or “On the pad”. Choose “Open Vault” in the menu bar or the Board’s “…” menu, press ⌘F and type.
Click a result and a pinned note comes to the front, or the pad it rests on comes forward. Escape clears the search, then closes the Vault. Inside Peel & Stick there are no folders or tags to sort notes into, which keeps it a simple notes app for Mac. How search reads:
- Capitals and accents don’t matter: “cafe” finds “Café”.
- Locked notes are left out.
- It finds typed words only, not drawings or handwriting.
Questions
Where are my sticky notes saved?
In Peel & Stick’s own storage on your Mac and, once you choose a folder, as .pstick files there too.
Can I back up my sticky notes?
Yes. Time Machine, or any backup that includes your notes folder, covers them. Time Machine also backs up Peel & Stick’s own storage, where locked notes sit encoded, not encrypted.
How do I move my notes to a new Mac?
Put the .pstick files in your notes folder on the new Mac, then quit and reopen Peel & Stick, or drop a file onto a pad. Locked notes stay in the app’s storage, so remove the lock first from any you want to bring.
Can I open a .pstick file by double-clicking it?
Not today. Drop the file onto a pad instead: it becomes the note it holds.
Can I export a note as a PDF, picture or text, or print it?
Not today: there is no export or print command. Each file’s manifest.json is readable text.
Can I undo a deletion?
No. “Unstick and Throw Away” and “Delete” are permanent: there is no Trash and no undo, and the note’s file leaves your folder too. A backup is your safety net.
