A mind map shows the shape of a note: the main ideas, what hangs off them, and how deep each branch goes. You can make one yourself on every plan, Free and Sync included, by writing its ideas as an outline. Having the AI build one from the note is part of the Pro and Lifetime plans, like AI flashcards, quizzes and slide decks, on Lifetime through your own API key. You can edit any map, the AI's included.
Creating one
Open the note. On desktop, type / and choose Mind Map. On mobile, open the apps group on the toolbar and choose Mind Map. Generating builds the map from the note content and from what the PDFs in it say, and the map stays attached to the note. Create by hand, under Create mind map, opens an outline to write instead.
You can close the dialog or the sheet while it is built. The card says Working on mind map until the map is ready, and Grape tells you when it is, see Get notified when the AI is done. On desktop, Cancel in the dialog stops it.
Making one by hand
On Free and Sync, the dialog or the sheet the card opens leads with Create by hand, with a small Let AI make it from your note link under it that says what the Pro plan adds. On Pro and Lifetime, Create by hand sits under Create mind map.
You write the map as an outline. The first line is the central topic, which starts as the note's title, and every line under it is an idea:
- Add idea adds a main branch at the end of the outline
- The buttons on an idea add an idea under it, Move in to hang it off the idea above, Move out to bring it back a level, and remove it, which takes the ideas under it along
- Ideas go up to four levels below the topic
On desktop the outline takes the keys any outliner does: Enter adds the next idea, Tab moves one in, Shift Tab moves it out, and Backspace in an empty idea removes it. Choose Save, the tick at the top of the sheet on mobile, and Grape draws the map with every branch open.
Editing a map
Open the map from the card in the note and choose Edit, the pencil at the top of the dialog on desktop or of the sheet on mobile. The map opens as the same outline, whether you wrote it or the AI did, so you can rename a branch, move an idea under another one or add what is missing. Save draws it again with every branch open. Editing works on every plan.
Exploring it
Pan around, zoom, and expand or collapse branches node by node, or all at once with the expand all and collapse all controls. The map remembers which branches you collapsed.
Mind map or graph view
They answer different questions. A mind map is the close up, the structure inside one note. Graph view is the wide shot, how notes across the whole library link to each other. Studying a topic, you want the mind map; checking coverage of a course, you want the graph.
What makes a good map
The map mirrors the note structure, so headings and short paragraphs produce clean branches. A note that is one long paragraph gives the map very little to work with. Writing the outline yourself works the other way round: if the branches will not sort themselves out, the note probably needs headings.
The other study tools
The same note can become flashcards or a quiz for drilling it, and a slide deck when you have to present it. All three can be made by hand too.