9 Must-Have Planner Accessories You Will Love

Planner accessories are the perfect way to add both function and personality to your agenda. After all, planners are a practical tool for helping you stay on track with your appointments, goals, and to-do list items. But that doesn’t mean they can’t also be a creative space for self-expression! 

In this article, we’ll cover some popular planner accessories and suggest how to use them to transform your planner from a functional tool to a fun yet completely practical area for creative expression. 

Each of these accessories can be used to add both personality and functionality. They can help you mark important pages, draw attention to important dates, and make the practice of using your planner more enjoyable overall.

Let’s take a look at some of our favorite must-have planner accessories!

1. Pens

As any notebook lover knows, selecting the right mix of pens to use in your planner is a sacred process.

While the ideal combo will vary depending on your personal preferences and the weight of your planner paper, the following pens are quite popular with journal-lovers around the globe:

  • Papermate InkJoy gel pens: These gel pens come in various colors and roll on smoothly with minimal smudging. They make a wonderful all-purpose pen. They will easily write on top of washi tape, whiteout, or highlighter marks without smudging or bleeding.
  • Zebra Mildliners: These popular highlighters come with two tips: a standard highlighter tip and a fine tip, making them a versatile marker for adding colorful flair and design throughout your planner.
  • Papermate Flairs: On the hunt for a fine-tip marker? Look no further. With a vast range of colors, a sleek design, and a versatile fine-tip, the Papermate Flair is a fantastic multi-purpose marker. Use them for coloring, taking notes, or doodling designs in your notebook!

If you’re not sure which pens you covet, create a swatch page at the beginning of your planner. That way, you can test out new pens and markers in order to find the combo that best fits your style. 

Don’t forget to test your pens and markers on different types of surfaces too! Some pens will bleed over top of markers but write beautifully on plain paper. Figuring out these nuances will keep the pages of your planner looking beautiful and tidy.

2. Stickers

Stickers are the ultimate planner accessory. They have so many fun uses and functions!

Decorative stickers add personality and flair to your planner pages. But don’t underestimate the practical uses of plain dot stickers

Use these to denote important dates and events within your planner or color code re-occurring items like tasks or bills. 

They can also be layered to create fun, colorful design elements. Plus, since they’re plain, you can easily write on them! 

There are other types of practical stickers too. For instance, Goldmine and Coco’s Clear Functional Sticker Set and Back to the Basic Planner Sticker Set contains stickers with symbols like grocery shopping, zoom meetings, conference calls, arrows, bills, and more.

These handy stickers make it easy to denote important agenda items in a visually intriguing way. This way, you can spot these events on your calendar with just a glance! 

If you’re looking to add more personality to your pages, check out our Girl Doll Stickers

3. Washi Tape

For those unfamiliar, washi tape is essentially decorative masking tape that makes a fantastic planner accessory. 

You can use it to create fun, festive frames around special days like birthdays or holidays. Or, wrap it around the edge of essential pages to create tabs and make them easy to find. You can even use washi tape as a decorative way to fasten notes, business cards, or other mementos into the pages of your planner. 

Because washi tape comes in unlimited colors and patterns, you’ll never get sick of searching out the perfect styles to match your planner’s personality.

4. Adhesive Pockets

Adhesive pockets are such a useful element to add to your planner. Sure, many planners come with a couple of pouches in the front for storing notes or papers, but you will likely want more flexibility than these pouches offer.

With adhesive pockets, you can introduce handy storage spaces throughout your notebook, wherever it makes sense.

You can use these pouches to store business cards, notes, stickers, photos, or anything else you may want to stash for later.

Add a corner pocket to store mementos and items that you collect each month. That way, you can quickly reference relevant items without having to sift through everything you’ve collected throughout the year. 

At the end of the year, go back through the items you collected each month to relive key moments from your year!

5. Stencils

Stencils make fabulous planner accessories as they help you add creative flair to your notebook. You can use them to introduce new lettering styles or incorporate designs throughout your planner pages.

Stencils come in all kinds of shapes and sizes, from letter of the alphabet to words, images, patterns, and more. There is no shortage of creative stencil options out there for you to experiment with. 

6. Paper Clips

Paper clips are another functional planner accessory that brings style and personality to your pages.

Use paper clips to mark essential pages for quick reference or attach notes, photos, and other mementos to your planner pages. 

Don’t settle for a dull, traditional silver paperclip when there are so many fun alternatives!

You can find all kinds of paperclips with flair. Wire paperclips come in all sorts of different shapes these days, like cats, stars, hearts, or even palm trees! You can even choose from various types of coatings. Instead of just silver, you can opt for gold, rose gold, or plastic-coated paperclips in a rainbow of colors. 

It’s also easy to find paperclips with crocheted or paper decorative elements attached to add personality.

If you can’t find any that suit your style, you can make your own decorative paperclips by creating designs from washi tape or scrapbook paper and gluing them onto a standard paperclip. The only limit is your imagination!

agenda cover

7. Agenda Covers

Agenda covers can transform your otherwise unremarkable planner into an accessory you’ll be proud to flaunt.

Besides adding a little style to your planner, agenda covers will protect your notebook from damage during transport—no need to worry about folded corners or dislodged pages. The front snap closure helps everything inside your planner stay in place so you can tuck in your purse or backpack when you’re on the go!

8. Stamps

Rubber stamps are another great way to add custom design elements to the pages of your planner. Once again, you’ll find both functional stamps and decorative ones.

You can stamp in dates, to-do list templates, words or phrases, or design elements like flowers, patterns, stars, and more. Use different ink colors to help the stamps conform to your design aesthetic! 

Etsy is a great place to browse for unique stamps, but you can pick them up at most stationary stores as well. You could even commission custom stamps with your signature, sign-off, or favorite catch-phrase! 

9. Scrapbook paper

Every collection of planner accessories should include a wealth of scrapbook paper. There are limitless ways to incorporate decorative paper into your planner.

Use it to create backgrounds for holidays on your calendar. Or, build frames around important dates, agenda items, or designs in your notebook. Cut it into shapes to create design elements and characters throughout your pages. Layering different colors and designs is a fun way to add visual interest to your planner spreads. 

Try using complementary colors and patterns of washi tape to fasten your decorative scrapbook paper into your notebook.

Overall Takeaways

As you can see, there are all kinds of fun planner accessories that you can use to personalize your agenda and make it fun to use. 

Each of the items on this list is just a jumping-off point. 

Use your creativity and imagination to put these accessories to use in one-of-a-kind ways that will make your notebook a true reflection of your personality and style. And most importantly, have fun while you do it! 


3 comments


  • Tas

    This was very helpful. As someone who is trying to use a planner and be creative so I will stick with it, these will come in handy.


  • Tina Moss

    As a new planner, these are excellent tips to help us get started. I feel more educated and more confident in using my Goldmine and Coco products.


  • Macey

    These are great things every planner needs and I love the details included with each item. I would have preferred photos with each thing listed but I still loved reading this!!!


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