Transfer Notes from iCloud

Question

I originally created an Apple ID for use on the App Store in iTunes. When Apple introduced iCloud my Apple ID ended up being used.

I recently creating a new iCloud ID for my personal use, retaining the original for Family Purchases.

I just realised that I have lost all my Notes, although these are still on the web in the original iCloud account.

Is there any way I can transfer these to my new iCloud ID? I would prefer a direct transfer if possible, or export data. At the worst I could copy one by one, but this would be tedious.

Answer 1

Transferring notes from one Apple-ID to another is quite difficult on iOS, because when you logout from one account all the notes in iCloud disappear locally, dissimilar to the contacts. so I recommend you to do this job on your Mac, it's so easy. I assume your notes sync with iCloud on your OS X machine.

1. Open note app, login your original iCloud ID if you haven't and wait for all the notes sync completely
2. Click the "Notes"->"add account" menu to add another iCloud account (you can only check to select "notes" service)
3. Click "View"->"Show Folders list" if the folders is hidden
4. Select oringal account from the folder on the left side
5. Choose the notes you want transfer by ⌘ or ⇧ Click, you can choose "Edit"->"Select All" as well
6. Drag all your selected notes to the new account on the left folder
7. Wait for the sync to complete and check the result on the iCloud web site.

Answer 2

I was able to move my iCloud notes to a new iCloud account using the following method.

1. Signout (if required) and Signin to the old iCloud account (via Settings / iCloud)
2. Go into Notes app on Mac
3. Go into Preferences
4. Select "Enable the On My Mac account"
5. Select all notes you want to move, right click and select "Move to/On My Mac/Notes"
6. Signout of the old iCloud account and Signin to the new iCloud account (via Settings / iCloud)
7. Select all notes you want to move, right click and select "Move to/iCloud/Notes"

Answer 3

In 2020 here's what I did setting up a new laptop with a new iCloud account. It's important you do steps 6+ after steps 1-5! Otherwise you'll have to move your notes all over again.

1. Confirmed adding a 2nd iCloud account on old laptop, you cannot include Notes :(
2. On my old Mac, Mojave, running old iCloud account, I added my Gmail account, just Notes
3. I created one note in that Notes section (named my gmail address, left sidebar)
4. On my new Mac, Catalina, I added same Gmail account, just the Notes
5. I created one note in that folder (also named my gmail address)

I found that the note that was created on old laptop before adding the Gmail account on my new laptop did not sync. I don't see it on the new laptop. Only after both laptop Notes apps had the gmail account did new notes created on one appear on the other.

So,

6. With Gmail account added on both laptops Notes, on old Laptop I dragged my old iCloud account notes into Gmail section in left side-bar.

7. Confirmed that those notes appear on new laptop, Gmail section

8. On new laptop, copy all the Gmail Notes into the new iCloud section

Step 8 means you can't see those notes on the old laptop anymore. So any notes you still want synced across both laptops, leave them in Gmail section.

Answer 4

It doesn't work with new Notes Update (2016) there are some new features that won't be moved :(

Answer 5

Just completed doing this. I had set up a new Apple ID, and all my notes remained under my old ID.

After discussing with Apple, we concluded that the best way in which to do this is to open the Notes app on my iMac and then copy/paste into it each note stored under my old ID.

Answer 6

In the latest MacOS releases, you can only have a single primary iCloud account regarding Notes storage (but not so for Mail, Cal, Contacts, Reminders).

In that case one solution is to use a Google account as go between to do the transfer of Notes, between iCloud accounts using two computers (or the same computer with a different user profile).

Go to Notes > Accounts > 'Plus Button' > Click Google

Continue down that path. Do this for both computers/user profiles.

Now start transferring Notes (select all, drag and drop to the desired Notes folder) from iCloud on the origination account, to your Notes store on Google. Then go to your destination computer/user profile, and transfer those Notes to your destination iCloud account