OneNote desktop/app section groups disappear

Question

Today I got a call from my coworker about not seeing sections in a OneNote notebook I share with her. The section was within a section group (e.g. Section Group A).

When I opened up my OneNote desktop version (Office 2013) I noticed all the sections within that section had disappeared. I also noticed sections within another section group (e.g. Section Group B) had also disappeared. All was perfectly fine less than 12 hours ago when I last used it.

So I closed OneNote and re-opened it and did a manual sync. Now ALL sections groups with the exception of the first section group (e.g. Section Group 00) had disappeared. In other words, "Section Group 00" shows up, "Section Group A", "Section Group B", "Section Group C" had all disappeared. All the sections NOT IN a section group shows up no problem.

When I used OneNote in a web browser, all the data is still there. When I used OneNote for Windows 10, all the data is still there.

I tried the OneNote app freshly installed from the MS Store on another Windows 11 machine, same behavior as OneNote desktop (Office 2013), no section groups except the first one. I tried the option "edit it Desktop app" feature from the web, and all the sections were still missing.

This is obviously some type of weird OneDrive synching issue that's only affecting the desktop versions (Office 2013 and Windows 11). I understand section groups are essentially subdirectories with individual sections stored as files within those subdirectories. So it must be some type of weird permission/access issue.

Does anyone have a workaround/fix other than "use the web version and wait for the fix?" This seems to only impact one shared notebook and not the others I share.

Answer 1

Hi @Alex S

The Q&A forum currently supports general usage issues of the OneNote Desktop app.

If you have any questions about the OneNote UWP application installed from MS Store, it is recommended to post a new thread in Microsoft Answers Community --- OneNote.

Besides, please note, Microsoft Support for Office 2013 has been ended on April 11, 2023.

Thanks for your understanding.

When I used OneNote in a web browser, all the data is still there.

I personally suggest you close the notebook include the section groups and re-open it (Before closing and reopening notebooks, make sure you copy and back up any unsynced recent data on the originating PC or device.).

• Right-click the notebook name in OneNote sidebar, close it.
• When the notebook is opened in OneNote for the web, select Open in Desktop App on the ribbon to re-open the notebook in the OneNote desktop app.

I also suggest you try the following workaround:

1. In the OneNote desktop app, create a new section within the same notebook.
2. Copy (but don't move) all of the pages from the old section into the new one that you just created. You can do this by right clicking each page, and then selecting Move or Copy.
3. When all of the pages have been copied to the new section, press Shift + F9 to manually sync the notebook. If a progress bar appears, wait for it to finish.

For more, please check in this link: Fix issues when you can't sync OneNote

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Answer 2

For the record, the problem fixed itself. It seems the it WAS a Microsoft backend issue.

I just had to wait about a month for them to fix it. Kinda nuts when you think about how much people/businesses depend on it.