Manage passwords for locking notes on Mac
You can change or reset the passwords you use to lock notes.
Change the password for locked notes
After you set a password for locking notes, you can change it.
In the Notes app
on your Mac, choose Notes > Preferences, then click Change Password.Note: If you have multiple accounts, select the one you want first.
Enter your current password in the Old Password field.
Enter your new password in the New Password field, then enter it again in the Verify field.
Enter a hint to help you remember the password.
The hint appears if you enter the wrong password two consecutive times.
Click Change Password.
All locked notes are updated to use the new password.
Important: When you change the password for an iCloud account, if you are also using the On My Mac account, you can keep both passwords the same. If you choose to do so, Notes automatically changes the On My Mac password to the same password as your iCloud account.
Reset your password
You should only reset your password if you’ve forgotten your current password, but still want to lock your future notes. Notes that are already locked still have the password in effect when you locked them.
Note: It’s highly recommended that you change the password (see “Change the password for locked notes” above) rather than reset it. When you reset the password, you have to manage multiple passwords, and you can’t easily tell which note is locked with which password.
In the Notes app
on your Mac, choose Notes > Preferences, click Reset Password, then click OK to confirm.Note: If you have multiple accounts, select the one you want first.
If this is an iCloud account, enter your iCloud password, then press Return.
Click Reset Password to verify that you want to reset the password.
Enter a password in the Password field, then enter it again in the Verify field.
Enter a hint to help you remember the password.
The hint appears if you enter the wrong password two consecutive times.
Click Set Password.
If you reset the password, when you view locked notes, entering the latest Notes password only unlocks notes that use the same password. If some of your notes use an earlier password, you must enter that password to view them.