I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again… I LOVE my Bullet Journal! But I love Bullet Journal hacks even more!!
If you’re not sure what a Bullet Journal is – then check out my Complete Beginner‘s Guide.
A well laid out Bullet Journal is the perfect tool to keep all aspects of your life organized! I use mine to track my health, my finances, the books I want to read… and of course, keep track of my schedule, appointments, and tasks!
But sometimes it can be time-consuming and… well… just a pain in the butt to keep up with your bujo!
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The Best Bullet Journal Hacks
Our Bullet Journals shouldn’t be a source of frustration or dread. We should enjoy creating them and using them. But sometimes it just seems to take too long to find what you need, or keep up with filling out a tracker.
I’m all about working ‘smarter’, but ‘harder’! So I’ve compiled my 10 favorite Bullet Journal Hacks to help save you time and energy while still keeping super organized!
Have a look through these ideas (with plenty of Bullet Journal eye-candy thrown in too!) and see which ones you can use in your own bujo!
Add a Storage Pocket
First up on our list of bujo hacks, is adding a storage pocket or envelop to your journal.
It really is incredibly simple to do, but will help keep you more organized. No more hunting around for your dentist’s appointment card!
Having a small pocket in your planner is the perfect place to keep business cards, appointment cards, notes, even a few dollar bills in case of emergencies!
The YouTube video below shows you how to make a really cute pocket for your journal. But the simplest solution is to just glue an envelope into the back of your planner.
A More Useful Index
Traditionally you will have an Index section in your Bullet Journal where you list out your page titles and the page number where you can find them.
But once your journal gets pretty full it can be hard to find things in the long index. So rather than just having a long list of pages, how about trying this Bullet Journal hack to organize them into sections or categories.
You could divide them up by month or topic – whichever works best for you!
Cutting Corners
I’m normally opposed to cutting corners (as my children will tell you when they try to rush their homework!) but in this case… I LOVE the idea!
OK, so this is a LITERAL cutting of corners, but it is such a great way to make your bujo quicker and easier to use!
How many times have you flipped back through your journal and realized that you have a bunch of unfinished pages or trackers? Sheepishly, raises hand…
Rather than forget about those unfinished pages, try this Bullet Journal hack instead! When a page or spread is completely finished snip the corner off the page. That way when you flip through your journal, you can see any pages without snipped corners and you know those pages still need more work!
This Instagram video below, from the wonderful Anna at the.annateur, shows you how it works.
Fold Out Cheatsheets
When you first start out with a Bullet Journal it can be tough to remember the different symbols used for different items. Is it a circle or a square for an appointment? What do the arrows mean again?
Rather than get confused and have to keep flipping back to your Key page, you can create a little flip-out reminder!
And these flip-outs aren’t just for remembering your Key. Nope, you can use them for all sorts of things! Habit tracking, goal setting, and more!
You can even use some washi tape and create a giant flip out… so you can have wide spreads that cover 3 pages (see below)!
Color Coding System
This is probably one of my favorite Bullet Journals hacks… color coding!
If you have a particularly full planner with masses of appointments, reminders, and tasks, it can be difficult to keep track of particular projects.
However, if you color-code your bujo, then you can see at a glance what the tasks relate to.
An excellent example is if you use your Bullet Journal to keep track of homework and assessments in school or college. You can color-code your entries according to which class they are for or how urgently they need to be done.
Washi Tape For The Win
Washi tape has gained so much popularity in the journalling world in the last few years… and for good reason! This stuff has so many uses in your journal!
If you don’t know what washi tape is, basically it’s a paper tape that comes in millions of colors, patterns, and sizes. And because it’s paper you can write on top of it!
You can use it to decorate your pages, add emphasis to particular parts of your page, cover mistakes (cough, cough), add titles and headers, mark page edges… and so much more!
Washi tape is easy to find in craft stores and Amazon has a massive selection of different types.
Using Sticky Notes
It can be so therapeutic and fun to create beautiful spreads in your journal. However…. they take time! Sometimes we just don’t have time to keep creating more and more spreads. So try this simple Bullet Journal hack instead…
You can create one beautiful spread and then use sticky notes to add the information to the page. When it’s time to update the layout, you just switch out the notes!
Smaller sticky notes can also be used to add emphasis or reminders to daily spreads.
Print and Stick
Another way to quickly create a fresh layout is to use a printable.
What’s a printable, I hear you ask? It’s basically a PDF file that you print at home. It could be anything… planner pages, worksheets, signs, notes, instructions… the list goes on!
So rather than recreating a layout each week in your bujo, you could quickly print one off and then stick it into your planner instead!
Dutch Door Spreads
Have you ever found yourself flipping backwards and forwards between pages in your planner? Yes? Well, this Bullet Journal hack is for you!
Dutch door spreads are simply where you cut a page in half (or into sections) so you can easily flip between different pages, while still have important information right in front of you.
I like to use dutch door spreads for my weekly layouts – I have the details of the month habit tracker across the top and then have the weeks on dutch door pages below.
Covering Mistakes
Mistakes happen.. we’re not perfect (as much as we might try to be!). But it can be soul-destroying to make a mistake on your beautiful Bullet Journal layout!
Maybe the cat jumped onto your lap at the wrong time, your kids decided to race past you and knock into the table… or it’s just a simple spelling mistake! Whatever the cause, you need to find a way to cover it up.
White-out is an option… but, well… generally it doesn’t look very good! Instead, you could try one of these solutions:
- Color over the area and then re-write it
- Use washi tape or sticker to cover it
- Cut out a small piece of blank page and stick over it
- Use a white gel pen….
What… wait! A white gel pen? Yep, if your pages are white, you can use a white gel pen to cover the mistake. Very carefully write over the lettering with the white pen. Allow it to completely dry and then you can just write back over the top of it!
Phew! I truly hope you find these 10 Bullet Journal hacks to be helpful! I use these tips every day and they help save me time and energy… which I desperately need!
