How to Lock Notes on Mac With a Password

Apple Notes can put individual notes behind a password — the contents drop out of sight in the list, out of search previews, and stay encrypted in iCloud. On macOS 13 and later you can simply reuse your Mac login password, which means one less password to forget. Here's the full setup.

Lock a note

1. Open Notes and find the note.
2. Right-click it in the notes list and choose Lock Note — or open the note and click the lock icon in the toolbar, then Lock Note.
3. The first time, Notes asks how to protect it: use your Mac login password (the default on macOS 13 Ventura and later, and the sane choice) or create a separate password with a hint.
4. The note now shows a lock badge. Its title stays visible in the list; the body is hidden.

One important model to internalize: it's one password for all locked notes per account, not a password per note. Every note you lock afterward uses the same method, and unlocking one locked note unlocks all of them for the session.

Unlock, re-lock, and Touch ID

• To read a locked note, click it and enter the password — or just touch the sensor: on Macs with Touch ID, Notes offers Use Touch ID when you set up locking, and a fingerprint opens the note instantly.
• Unlocked means unlocked-for-now. Notes stay open until you quit Notes, lock the screen, or click the lock icon → Close All Locked Notes. Do that last one when you walk away from a shared machine.
• To remove protection entirely, right-click the note and choose Remove Lock. The note returns to normal visibility everywhere.

Login password vs. custom password

Both are set per account in Notes → Settings… On Ventura, Sonoma, and Sequoia the login-password option wins for almost everyone: nothing new to remember, Touch ID works, and your notes unlock with the credential you already guard. Choose a custom password only if other people know your Mac login — a shared family iMac, say — and you want notes private from them. Be careful with that choice: Apple can't recover a forgotten custom Notes password. You can reset it in Settings, but the reset only affects notes locked from then on — previously locked notes stay sealed with the old password.

What can't be locked

• Shared notes — a note with collaborators can't be locked; locking is for private notes only.
• Notes in third-party accounts — locking works for iCloud and On My Mac notes. Notes syncing from Google or other IMAP accounts don't support it (those accounts sync over plain IMAP and can't carry the encryption).
• Some attachment types — if Lock Note is grayed out on a note with audio or video in it, the attachment is the reason; move it out and lock the rest.

Locked notes are end-to-end encrypted in iCloud, so they're protected in transit and on Apple's servers — and they unlock on your iPhone and iPad with the same password or Face ID.

What locking hides — and what it doesn't

A locked note's title stays visible in the notes list and in search results; only the body and attachments are sealed. So name locked notes blandly — "Household" beats "Safe combination + passport numbers." The body's text drops out of search entirely while locked, which cuts both ways: you can't find a locked note by its contents, only its title. And locking protects the note inside Notes — it doesn't lock your Mac. Anyone with your login password can open Notes as you, which is the argument for the custom-password option on genuinely shared machines, and for locking the screen when you step away regardless.