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EndNote Tutorials: How to Create a Group / Smart Group?

EndNote is a citation management tool used by researchers, faculty, and students to store, organize and cite references. This guide is to show how to use EndNote effectively.

How to Create a Group?

In EndNote, you can organize your references by group. You can create multiple groups and place numerous references in each group. In this page, you will learn how to create a custom group or a group set. 

  • Open EndNote.
  • On the left Navigation pane, mouse over My Groups set.
  • Right click on My Groups and then choose Create Group.
  • The default name for the Group is New Group. You may rename the Group by right clicking  and choosing Rename Group.
  • Rename the group to a name of your choice. A group has thus been created.
  • Now you can drag selected references into the custom group.

How to Create a Group Set?

  • Open EndNote.
  • On the left Navigation pane, mouse over My Groups set.
  • Right click on My Groups and then choose Create Group Set.
  • The default name for the Group is New Group Set. You may rename the Group set by right clicking and choosing Rename Group Set.
  • Rename the group set to a name of your choice. A group set has thus been created.

How to Create a Smart Group?

Smart Group saves your search strategy so that each time you perform a search on the same topic, you do not need to type in the terms each time. All you need to do is to click on the previously created smart group. Below are the steps to creating a smart group:

  • Open EndNote.
  • On the left Navigation pane, mouse over My Groups set.
  • Right click on My Groups and then choose Create Smart Group.
  • In the next popup Smart Group window, give a name to the smart group.
  • Perform a search on the topic of your interest by entering the search terms in the appropriate search boxes.
  • Then click the Create button on the lower left corner of the popup window.
  • A smart group is created and placed on the left Navigation pane, displayed with a gear icon next to it.

How to Edit a Smart Group?

  • Open EndNote.
  • On the left Navigation pane, mouse over the Smart Group.
  • Right click on the Smart Group and then choose Edit Group.
  • In the next popup Smart Group window, edit the search strategy that was created for this group.
  • Then click on the Save button. The search strategy for that Smart Group has been updated.

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