Shared Notebooks: OneDrive vs. SharePoint

OneNoteToWiki supports syncing content from shared notebooks, but there are important differences in how Microsoft handles OneDrive-based and SharePoint-based notebooks. This article explains what’s supported today — and what’s coming next.

🧭 What are Shared Notebooks?

A shared notebook is a OneNote file that multiple people can access and edit. These notebooks can be hosted in different locations:

  • 📁 OneDrive (Personal or Business)

  • 🏢 SharePoint (Microsoft 365 Groups, Teams channels, SharePoint sites)

Although Microsoft presents these as one seamless experience, they are technically distinct systems — with different access models, APIs, and behaviors.

✅ Currently Supported: OneDrive-Based Notebooks

OneNoteToWiki supports shared notebooks hosted in OneDrive. This includes:

  • Notebooks created in a user’s personal or business OneDrive

  • Notebooks shared with others via direct access or link

These are accessible via the Microsoft Graph API as long as the current user is the owner or was granted access.

🚫 Not Yet Supported: SharePoint-Based Notebooks

SharePoint-hosted notebooks (e.g. in Microsoft Teams or SharePoint libraries) are not yet supported due to the more complex access requirements and structural differences.

🛠️ Support for SharePoint-based notebooks is in active development.

⚠️ Known Limitation: Microsoft Graph "20,000 Items" Bug

There is a known issue in the Microsoft Graph API:

If the underlying storage location (OneDrive or SharePoint) contains more than 20,000 items total, access to certain resources (including OneNote notebooks) may silently fail.

  • ✅ This does not affect notebooks owned by the currently logged-in user, as we have implemented a reliable workaround

  • ❌ However, the workaround does not work for shared notebooks (e.g. OneDrive-hosted)

  • 🧪 We are actively investigating this issue and are in direct contact with Microsoft

Temporary Recommendation

If you experience issues when syncing a shared notebook:

  • Try moving the notebook to a personal or team OneDrive with fewer than 20,000 items

  • Contact our support for help identifying whether this limitation applies

🧪 How to Check Where a Notebook is Hosted

  1. Open the notebook in OneNote online

  2. Check the URL or location info:

    • onedrive.live.com / -my.sharepoint.com → OneDrive

    • sharepoint.com / teams.microsoft.com → SharePoint

📌 Summary

Feature OneDrive SharePoint
Sync supported ✅ Yes 🚫 Not yet
Affected by 20k item bug ⚠️ Only in rare cases ❌ Yes (no workaround yet)
Requires special setup ❌ No ✅ Yes
ETA for support — 🧪 In progress

📣 Coming Soon

We’re working on:

  • Full support for SharePoint-based notebooks

  • Detection and sync of shared notebooks across Microsoft 365

  • Guidance and tooling to identify sync-blocking limitations

If you’re affected by these issues, or need early access to SharePoint support, get in touch with our team — we're happy to help.