My old anime watch list system was a total mess (like, three different notebooks)

Shane Nguyen · 2026-03-17T07:40:07.354387+00:00

I used to keep everything in physical notebooks, with one for seasonal shows, one for completed stuff, and a third for 'maybe later' titles (it was chaos). About eight months ago, I finally switched to a single spreadsheet after I lost the 'maybe later' book for a solid week. Now I have columns for season, studio, my rating out of 10, and even a link to the discussion thread I liked best. The change happened because I realized I was having the same 'have you seen this' conversation online like five times. Has anyone else found a better way to organize what you've watched versus what you want to talk about?

nelson.michael7mo ago

Oh man, "notes app mess" is so real. I had a similar thing with a bunch of random notes on my phone, titles with no context. I'd see a show mentioned, jot it down, and then have NO idea why I saved it six months later. Switching to a spreadsheet was a game changer. I even added a column for where I can watch it, because I got tired of searching three different services. It feels so good to just have one place to look.

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aaron_gonzalez7mo ago

Your spreadsheet sounds way better than my notes app mess.

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abby_kim557mo ago

Ugh, I feel this so hard. My system was just a huge list in my phone's notes, and I'd always forget if I dropped a show or just put it on hold. I started adding little codes next to each title, like "DNF" for did not finish or "OH" for on hold. I also made a separate list just for shows I actually want to recommend to people, so I'm not digging through everything. It's way less stressful now.

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