Google Drive sync is initially turned off. To enable it, click your profile picture on the top right, go to Settings > Data and files and turn on the switch for Google Drive.
<aside> <img src="/icons/info-alternate_lightgray.svg" alt="/icons/info-alternate_lightgray.svg" width="40px" /> Note: You will be asked to sign in with your Google account and grant access to Google Drive, unless you have done so before.
Paperpile only has access to the files you have uploaded via Paperpile, not your entire Google Drive. You can learn more about our Google account permissions here.
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Once enabled, all syncing takes place in the background without manual action.
To check if a file is synced, open the file panel by clicking the paperclip symbol of the reference in the main list. The drive icon indicates the sync status of a file:
The contents in Google Drive always reflect your Paperpile library. Make any changes (e.g. delete or rename a file) directly in Paperpile, not in Google Drive — this is the safest way to ensure you don't see unexpected results. However, Paperpile is smart and works hard to automatically fix any inconsistencies encountered during sync.
By default, files are arranged in folders by the first letter of the first author's last name. All files are prefixed with 'Author year' of the reference they belong to (e.g. 'Crow and Kimura 1970'). The main PDF for a reference is renamed with the title, while all supplementary files keep their original filename (plus the 'Author year' prefix).
You can change how files are named and organized. Go to Settings > General and click Set file and folder name pattern…
