Make your handwritten notes and sketches more precise with lines and grids

You can add lines and grids to notes in the Notes app to help with handwriting, graphics, and more.

While you may often use the Notes app on your current iPhone or iPad for text the most, it does have the ability for handwritten notes and sketches too. But don’t you hate it when handwriting a note, and your writing just ends up going crooked because there are no lines to guide you? I mean, that’s why lined or grid notebooks are so popular, so why not have the same capability in the Notes app?

Don’t worry, the Notes app does have an option for lines and grids so your handwritten notes and sketches are always precise and accurate, not off-center and sloppy. Here’s how to get lines and grids in the Notes app on your best iPhone and iPad.

Lines and grids in Notes on iOS:

How to add lines and grids to a new note
How to add lines and grids from an action extension
How to set a line or grid as the default note style
How to remove a line or grid from a sketch

How to access lines and grids from a new note

When you start a new note in the Notes app, something with no writing on it, you can access lines and grids directly when you tap the Share icon.

Launch the Notes app on iPhone or iPad.
Start a new note

Tap the … in the upper right corner of the screen.

Tap Lines and Grids.

Select a style of line or grid.

How to access lines and grids from Action Extensions in the Notes app

Action Extensions are extra tools that let you perform tasks within an app. If you’ve already started a note — if you’ve already written or sketched something — you’ll be directed to Action Extensions to access lines and grids.

Launch the Notes app on iPhone or iPad.
Select a note.

Tap the … in the upper right corner of the screen.

Tap Lines and Grids.

Select a style of line or grid.

You’ll see that when you tap the Share icon, it brings up the standard share drawer, showing other sharing options and tools (like locking a note or creating a PDF).

How to set a line or grid as the default note style

If you’re likely to use the same grid or line every time you use the Notes app, you don’t have to select it for each note. You can set one as the default, and every new note will default with that selection.

Launch the Settings app on iPhone or iPad.

Tap Notes.

Tap Lines & Grids.

Select a style of line or grid.

From now on, all of your new notes will launch with that style.

How to remove a line or grid from a note

If you want to save or share a note without having a grid or line in the background, you can remove it at any time, even if you’ve got it set as a default note style.

While in the note, tap the … in the upper right corner of the screen.
Tap Lines and Grids.

Select the blank style.

This will remove the line or grid from the background but leave everything you wrote or sketched in place.

Make it straight with lines and grids

As you can see, the Notes app is meant to be like a replacement for paper notebooks, with lines and grids and all that jazz. With this feature, your handwritten notes, diagrams, and sketches will look better than ever since you’ll have lines and grids to guide you — no more crooked writing! It’s easy to access this tool, and just as easy to turn it off when you don’t need it.

Updated March 2022: Updated for iOS 15.