Before we dive into all the different block types, it’s important to understand parent and child relationships between blocks.
In general, every single block in Notion is independent. There are some that are connected (like Synced blocks – covered a few lessons later), but every block has its own ID, and can be moved fully independently of any other blocks.
- Unindented list item
- List item indented one level
This does change, however, when we try to nest blocks under each other. Nesting happens when, for example, you create a numbered list, and you’d like to indent the list by one level:
While in a List block (Numbered, Bulleted, Toggle, or To-Do), you can indent your list by hitting Tab, and unindent by hitting Shift + Tab (similar to many other text editors). While each individual list item is also an individual block, as soon as you indent, the indented block becomes a child block and the unindented becomes the parent. This is a unique relationship between blocks in Notion — and while this is something you’ll experience with Lists, most other block types can also be nested.
Two very important things about nesting:
- We can only nest a block that has a different block above. After all, there needs to be a Parent!
- We can only nest two (or more) blocks of the same type.
Try this yourself – just hit Tab on a text or list block, that has a block of the same type above it, and see how nesting works!
[Nesting demo GIF]
Copy link to headingTransforming
When you try to move or transform a Parent block, all of its Child blocks will also be moved, or transformed.
This means that you don’t have to select all the blocks to move or transform – just select the Parent, and all of its Children will also get selected. This is useful when transforming lists, but also other blocks.
[Transforming nested blocks GIF]
Copy link to headingLimitations
There are a few block types that can’t be nested, or can’t have blocks nested under them.
Most notably, headings. We can’t nest regular headings, nor nest other blocks under. There is a second type of heading blocks: Toggle Headings, that can have child blocks, but we’ll discuss those in a later lesson.
We also can’t nest dividers, Simple Tables, Database Views, and some Advanced Blocks. *(Except under Toggle Lists or Toggle Headings, but that’s for later!). *****All basic block types can be nested under a block of the same type.