Quickly create neat lines and shapes while inking in OneNote on Windows

(Originally posted January 13, 2023 By ~ Katie Sullivan)

Hello, Insiders! I’m Katie Sullivan, a Product Manager on the Office Natural User Interface team. I’m excited to share that we’re making more improvements to the Pen & Ink experience in OneNote for Windows. Based on your feedback, we’re making it easier to create straight lines and clean shapes!

memo: If you missed our previous post about pen and ink improvements in OneNote for Windows, Check it out!

Quickly create clean lines and shapes while ink-ing in OneNote on Windows.

When you use ink in OneNote to take notes, brainstorm ideas, or create content, lines and shapes appear everywhere.

You can now use drawing and pinning gestures to create cleaner lines and shapes.

Draw a line, arrow, or shape (circle, oval, triangle, square, rectangle, rhombus, pentagon, or hexagon) with one stroke, then hold the pen still for a few milliseconds and watch the shape transform into a cleaner version. While still holding, you can drag to rotate or resize the shape.

Drawing and pinning gestures

That’s not all! Another option you can now use is a keyboard shortcut to create a straight ink line. Hold down the Shift key while drawing a line and a straight line will automatically be created between the stroke start point and the cursor.

No need to rely on rulers anymore.

How it works

Drawing and pinning gestures

1. Draw a line, arrow, or shape (circle, oval, triangle, square, rectangle, rhombus, trapezoid, pentagon, or hexagon) with a single ink stroke using a pen, then hold it in place for a few milliseconds.
2. After the shape is transformed, you can leave the ink as is, or drag it to resize or rotate the transformed shape!

Shift key shortcuts

1. To automatically draw a straight line between the start point of a stroke and the cursor, hold down the Shift key before drawing the line.
2. Continue moving your cursor, finger, or pen to adjust the length and angle of the line. memo: The lines are automatically aligned to 0, 45, and 90 degrees.

If you want a little more flexibility, you can release the Shift key to disable the snapping behavior and adjust the line to wherever you want on the screen.

effectiveness

This feature is available to Beta channel users running:

• Drawing and pinning gestures: Version 2212 (Build 15926.10000) or later
• Shift key shortcuts: Version 2212 (Build 15914.10000) and later

These features include: ~ No Available for OneNote for Windows 10.

Features are released over time to ensure everything works smoothly. They are released slowly to a larger number of Insiders, highlighting features you may not have. Sometimes we remove elements based on your feedback to make them even better. This is rare, but we also have the option to completely remove a feature from the product, even if you, as an Insider, had the opportunity to try it out.

feedback

We want to hear from you! Click hereHelp > Feedback Submit your thoughts on this feature in OneNote for Windows. We’d love to hear your thoughts!

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