StacyBasics · Productivity
Tags vs Folders: Which Should You Use for Your Notes?
Tags vs folders, settled practically: what each is actually good at, why links quietly beat both, and simple decision rules for every kind of note you keep.
TL;DR: Folders win when a note has one obvious home; tags win when a quality cuts across topics. Keep both small, and let links between notes do the heavy lifting.
Somewhere in your notes app there is a folder called "Misc." Next to it, if you have been at this long enough, sits "Misc 2." And you have a tag — maybe #important, maybe #toread — that you applied faithfully for eleven days in 2024 and never once clicked.
The tags vs folders debate has been running as long as note apps have existed, and it usually goes nowhere because it is framed as a war. It is not. Tags and folders are different tools that answer different questions, and the practical answer is a light mix of both — with links doing the work everyone expects tags to do.
Let's settle it properly.
Tags vs folders: what each is actually good at
Folders answer "where does this live?" A note goes in exactly one folder, and that constraint is the feature. When your tax documents live in one place, you never wonder whether you filed the receipt under #taxes or #finance or #2026. Folders are great for:
- Notes with one obvious home: a project, a client, a course
- Things you retrieve by browsing, not searching
- Archiving — a "done" folder you never think about again
Tags answer "what kind of thing is this?" A note can carry several tags at once, which makes them perfect for qualities that cut across topics. A book note might belong to your "Reading" folder and be #psychology and #unread. Tags are great for:
- Status:
#draft,#waiting,#someday - Format:
#quote,#recipe,#template - Cross-cutting themes that would fragment your folders if you tried to make them folders
Where each one falls apart
Folders fail when a note plausibly belongs in two places. Is the note from your meeting with the design agency filed under "Meetings" or "Website Redesign"? Pick either and you will look in the other one first. Deep folder trees make this worse: six levels down, every note is technically filed and practically lost.
Tags fail through entropy. Nobody audits their tag list, so it quietly grows #book, #books, #reading, and #to-read, each holding a third of your book notes. A tag system only works if the list is small enough to hold in your head — and almost nobody keeps it that small.
Both share a deeper flaw: they group notes into piles, but they can't express that this specific idea relates to that specific one. "These 40 notes are all tagged #psychology" is not knowledge. It is a pile with a label.
The real answer: links, plus a light mix
Links — and especially backlinks, links that work in both directions so a page knows what points at it — do what tags pretend to do. When your note on the Zeigarnik effect links to your note on why you can't stop thinking about unfinished projects, you have connected two ideas, not tossed them in the same bucket. Over time those connections form a map you can actually navigate. We cover this in depth in how backlinks work in note-taking, and it is the engine behind systems like the Zettelkasten method.
So the working setup looks like this:
- A shallow folder set — think five to ten top-level homes, something like the PARA method's projects, areas, resources, and archive
- A short tag list — ten-ish tags, mostly for status and format
- Links everywhere — whenever a note reminds you of another note, connect them on the spot
Tools shape this. In a local-first workspace like Stacy, backlinks are built in, so linking two notes automatically shows the relationship from both sides — the map builds itself as you write.
Decision rules by note type
When you're staring at a note wondering where it goes, use this:
| Note type | Folder? | Tags? | Links? |
|---|---|---|---|
| Project notes | Yes — the project folder | Status only (#active, #done) |
To related decisions and people |
| Meeting notes | Yes — one "Meetings" home | #waiting for follow-ups |
To the project and attendees |
| Book and article notes | One "Reading" folder | Format (#book) and #unread |
Heavily — to every idea they touch |
| Fleeting ideas | One inbox, sorted later | Rarely | Once processed |
| Reference (manuals, receipts) | Yes — deep filing is fine here | No | Rarely |
Two rules of thumb fall out of this. If you retrieve something by browsing to it, folders. If you retrieve it by thinking of a related idea, links. Tags are the garnish, not the meal.
And one meta-rule: when in doubt, under-organize. Search is good now. A note in the wrong folder with a decent title is findable; a note you never wrote because filing felt like homework is gone. If your structure needs a rethink, our guide on how to organize your notes walks through the whole system, not just this one fight.
The verdict
The tags vs folders debate ends in a truce: folders for notes with one obvious home, a small trustworthy tag list for status and format, and links between ideas for everything that actually matters. Set it up once, keep it boring, and go take some notes — "Misc 2" has waited long enough.
Frequently asked questions
Should I use tags or folders to organize my notes?
Use folders for notes with one obvious home, like a project or a client. Use tags for qualities that cut across topics, like the note's status or format. Most people do best with a shallow folder set, a tag list of under fifteen tags, and links between related notes.
Can I use both tags and folders together?
Yes, and you probably should. They answer different questions. Folders answer where a note belongs, tags answer what kind of note it is. The mistake is building two complete parallel systems and maintaining both. Keep each one light.
How many tags is too many?
If you cannot recite your tag list from memory, it is too long. Around ten to fifteen tags is the practical ceiling for most people. Past that you start creating near-duplicates like productivity and prodctivity and time-management, and the system stops being trustworthy.
Are links better than tags and folders?
For connecting related ideas, yes. A link points to one specific note, while a tag points to a pile of loosely similar ones. Links, especially backlinks that work in both directions, build a map of how your ideas actually relate. Tags and folders still help for filing and filtering.