Keep research beside the document
Shelf is for material that supports the writing but does not belong in the draft yet. That might be a quotation, a link, a reminder, an argument to develop or a passage you have temporarily removed.
Each document has its own Shelf. Notes from one document do not automatically appear in another, so the research stays with the work it supports.
Create a note or capture text from the draft
Open Shelf and create a new note when you want a blank place to think. You can also select text in the document and save that passage to Shelf instead of deleting or copying it into another app.
Give longer notes a useful title. When you return weeks later, a clear title is often more valuable than a perfectly organised tag system.
Format, tag, pin and archive notes
Shelf notes can contain formatted text, lists and links. Add tags when they help you group related material. Pin the notes you need often and archive notes you want to keep out of the active list.
Views for All, Pinned, Links and Archive help narrow what you see without changing the note itself.
Do not tag every note by habit. A small set of useful tags is easier to search than dozens of labels that you rarely reuse.
Search and sort as the Shelf grows
Search looks through note content, and tag filters help when several notes cover the same theme. You can sort by recent editing, creation time or title.
Those search and sort choices are just the current view. They do not become part of the document you later share or export.
Bring a note back into the document
When material is ready to become part of the draft, use Add to document. Compose inserts the note content into the writing surface, where it becomes normal editable document content.
This makes Shelf useful as a holding area. You can develop an idea away from the main text, then move it into place deliberately.
What is kept and what Free allows
Shelf notes and their content are kept in the .compose file. Keep that file when those notes are part of the work you need to back up.
A Free document can contain up to eight Shelf notes. Pro and Teams remove the creation limit, and notes already present remain available if you later move to Free.