Open a note, press Import, then choose the Google Drive card, or use New note from Drive on the notes screen, then choose the file in Google's picker. The file's text lands in the note with its headings and lists kept, under a first line that links back to the original. Google Docs, Slides, Sheets, PDFs, Word and PowerPoint files all work, up to 25 MB each.
Most people write class notes somewhere before they write them in a study app. Usually that somewhere is Google Docs: a running document per course, a lecture per heading, a lab report in Slides. Retyping all of that is not a study plan.
Where do I find Google Drive?
Two places, and they do the same thing:
Inside a note. Open any note, press Import, and choose the Google Drive card. It adds the file's text to the note you have open, after what is already there.
On the notes screen. New note from Drive makes a fresh note titled after the file you choose.
If you do not see Google Drive in either place, it is not available in this copy of the app. Add from file does the same job with a file you have downloaded.
This is a Scholarwire feature, and it works with or without Canvas connected. You can start free and have a lecture doc in a note in a couple of minutes.
How do I choose the file?
Google Drive opens and asks you to sign in, if you are not already, and then to choose a file. This is Google's picker: we never see your Google password, and we never see a list of your files. You choose, Google gives this browser a one-time permission for the files you chose, and the browser downloads them straight from Google.
Nothing goes through our servers on the way. The permission lives in the tab for the length of the import and is thrown away when it finishes.
What comes across from each kind of file?
Google Docs. Headings, paragraphs, bullet lists, numbered lists, quotes and links all survive. A Doc arrives looking like the Doc.
Google Slides. One heading per slide, with the slide's text underneath, which is what makes a deck usable as study material rather than a wall of text.
Google Sheets. The first sheet, as rows of text. A spreadsheet is rarely notes, but a table of terms and definitions is, and that is the case this covers.
PDFs and pictures. Kept whole and shown inside the note, the same as uploading one from your computer. A PDF is not converted to text here: if you want it read, ask for a summary from inside the note.
Word and PowerPoint files in your Drive. Read exactly the way Add from file reads them, with the original kept on the note so the formatting is never lost.
Google Forms, Drawings, Sites and shortcuts are refused, with a sentence saying so. There is nothing in them a note can use.
The size limit is 25 MB per file. A file over it is named and skipped rather than half imported.
What is the line at the top of the note?
Every import writes one line first: From Google Drive, then the file's name, linked to the file in Drive. Press it and you are back in the original document. The link is kept on the note itself as well, so it survives even if you edit that first line away.
Notes copied from somewhere else go stale when the original changes, and a note that cannot tell you where it came from is one you stop trusting.
What can I do with it once it is in?
The text is a note now, which means everything a note can do:
- Make flashcards from it and review them on the spaced repetition schedule.
- Generate a quiz on it before an exam.
- Ask for a study guide or a summary.
- File it under a course and give it a class date, then sort your notes by class date to line it up with the week it belongs to.
A lecture doc that has sat in Drive since September becomes a deck you can revise from in about a minute. How the review schedule decides when each card comes back is in spaced repetition and FSRS explained for students, and fitting the review into a real week is how to turn Canvas assignments into a weekly study schedule.
What does the app never do with my Drive?
We never write to your Drive. We never read a file you did not pick. We never upload the file to our servers, and we never keep the Google permission after the import finishes. What ends up stored is the note text itself, on your device and, on Pro, in your encrypted synced copy, exactly like a note you typed.
What if something goes wrong?
Google would not send that file
Usually a file you can see but not download, for example one shared as view-only with downloads turned off. Ask the owner, or make a copy in your own Drive and choose the copy.
Nothing happened when I pressed the button
A pop-up blocker stops Google's picker from opening. Allow pop-ups for this site and try again.
The formatting looks flat
Google's export keeps headings, lists and links, but not colours, columns or images inside a Doc. The words are what a study tool needs; the rest is decoration.