About accounts and folders in Notes on Mac
Notes is organized first by accounts (iCloud or On My Mac, for example) and then by folders. Some folders are automatically created:
All [account]: Only appears if you create your own folders. Shows notes from all folders in the account (except the Recently Deleted folder). For example, if you use iCloud notes, there’s an All iCloud folder. If available, it always appears first within the account.
Notes: Contains notes that aren’t in folders you created or the Recently Deleted folder. The folder always appears second within the account.
Recently Deleted: Only appears if you’ve deleted a note in the last 30 days (either from this Mac or from your devices that have iOS 9 or later, iPadOS, or OS X 10.11 or later or from iCloud.com). This folder always appears last within an applicable account.
Important: If you haven’t upgraded your iCloud notes or are using a notes account other than iCloud, there is no Recently Deleted folder, and deleted notes are removed permanently from all devices that use the same account.
Additionally, you can create your own folders.
Keep in mind the following about moving notes or folders:
If you move notes or folders from one account to another, you might permanently lose formatting and attachments in your notes. For example, drawings might be turned into graphics files that can’t be edited using the sketch editor in Notes on iOS or iPadOS devices.
Within an account, the “All [account]” folder is listed first, followed by the Notes folder. You can move your remaining folders in any order you want (not just alphabetical).
You can only move or copy locked notes between folders in your iCloud and On My Mac accounts (and you may need to unlock them to do so).
If you’ve added people to a note using your iCloud account, or you’ve been added to a note using your iCloud account, you can only move or copy the note between folders in the same iCloud account.
When you view a folder, by default, the most recently created or changed notes are listed first. You can change the default sort order in Notes preferences for all notes; you can also change the sort order for each folder you create.
You can also pin your most important notes to the top of the notes list for easy access if you’re using upgraded iCloud notes on macOS High Sierra 10.13 or later.