Research projects

Research is accumulation followed by synthesis. You gather sources from different places, in different formats, over different periods of time, and then you need to make sense of them together. The gathering is easy. The problem is that by the time you need to synthesise, your material is spread across a dozen tools and you can't see across it. The reading you did three weeks ago is in a different app from the notes you took yesterday, and neither knows about the PDF you downloaded this morning. Every research project eventually hits the same wall: you have the material, but you can't work with it as a whole.

This page is for anyone running a research process, whether academic, professional, journalistic, or personal, who needs one place to gather, annotate, and search across sources of every type, with an AI that helps with the synthesis.

The problem

Sources arrive from everywhere in every format. A research project pulls in PDFs, web articles, screenshots, images, audio, email threads, bookmarks, slide decks, and your own notes. They come from databases, browsers, inboxes, and conversations. No single tool was designed to hold all of them, so they scatter across your file system by default.

You can't search across the whole picture. Keyword search only works when you remember the right words. And it only works within one tool at a time. When your research spans PDFs in one app, notes in another, and bookmarks in a third, there's no way to ask a question across all of it. The connections that would make the research click stay invisible because your tools can't see each other.

The synthesis step is manual and fragile. Pulling together what you know means opening every source, re-reading, re-remembering, and mentally holding the threads. It's slow, it depends on your memory, and it breaks when the volume of material exceeds what you can keep in your head. The more thorough your research, the harder the synthesis becomes.

What Fabric changes

Everything lives in one searchable place. PDFs, articles, images, audio, notes, bookmarks, screenshots, and documents all go into Fabric, regardless of format or where they came from. Your research is one body of material, not fragments across tools.

You search by meaning, not by memory. Ask a question in plain language and Fabric finds every source, note, and annotation that's relevant, across everything you've saved. It reads inside documents and images, so the answer surfaces whether it's in a PDF, a screenshot, or a note you wrote weeks ago.

The AI helps you synthesise. Instead of manually re-reading and mentally threading your sources together, you can ask the assistant what your material says about a topic, where your sources agree or conflict, or what you haven't covered yet. It works from your research, not the open web.

How it works

Search across everything you've gathered. Fabric's AI search works on meaning and reads inside every file type. Ask "arguments for decentralised identity in healthcare" and get results from across your PDFs, notes, clippings, and annotations, however they were titled or filed.

An AI research assistant. The AI assistant works from your saved material. Ask it to summarise what you've collected on a theme, compare perspectives across sources, identify gaps in your research, or draft from your gathered material. It synthesises from your sources rather than generating from its general training.

Annotate as you read. Annotate directly on PDFs, documents, and images. Your highlights and comments become part of the searchable whole, so the thinking you do while reading is findable later alongside the source material.

Capture from anywhere. Clip web pages, save PDFs, forward emails to your email-to-note address, photograph documents, or pull in files from Google Drive, Dropbox, or Notion. Every source arrives in the same place.

Write and think alongside your sources. Use notes and docs to draft, outline, and think with your research material right there. Link to sources as you write so the trail from conclusion to evidence stays intact.

Organise visually when it helps. Spread sources and notes across the canvas to see relationships spatially. Useful when you need to map a landscape, plan a structure, or see the shape of what you've gathered.

A research workflow in Fabric

Start a space for the project. Give the research its own space so the material is grouped together, browsable for focus and searchable for breadth.

Gather without organising. Save every source as you find it. Don't worry about filing or naming. The material is findable by what it's about, not where you put it.

Annotate as you go. Highlight and comment on sources while they're fresh. Those annotations become searchable, so you're building the synthesis layer as you read rather than trying to reconstruct it later.

When you need to make sense of it, ask. Search a theme across all your material. Ask the assistant to summarise what you've collected, surface contradictions, or identify what's missing. The synthesis that used to take hours of re-reading becomes a conversation with your own research.

Draft from the synthesis. Write in Fabric with your sources searchable alongside the draft. When you need to check a claim or find the original evidence, it's one search away.

What compounds over time

Research in Fabric doesn't reset between projects. The sources you gathered for one project are still there, still searchable, when a later project touches the same territory. Over time, your Fabric becomes a personal research library: everything you've ever read, annotated, and thought about, searchable by meaning and growing more useful with every source you add.

The AI gets more helpful as the library deepens. A question that draws on fifty annotated sources produces a richer synthesis than one drawing on five. The investment in gathering and annotating pays dividends across every future project that touches the same ground.

For structured approaches to research, see the guides to research workflow, building a second brain, and the zettelkasten method.

Related use cases

If your research is academic, the more specific workflows may fit better: literature review for synthesis across many papers, dissertation and thesis for managing a multi-year project. For professional research contexts, see competitive research and market research. If you're building a permanent personal knowledge system, second brain covers the lifelong version. Fabric is built for researchers across every field.

Get started

Bring your sources, notes, and annotations into one place and research from a system that lets you search and synthesise across all of it. Try Fabric free.

Comparing tools? See why researchers choose Fabric as the best way to organise research and the best second brain app.

FAQs

What types of sources can I save in Fabric?

PDFs, web articles, images, screenshots, audio, video, slide decks, Word documents, emails, bookmarks, and your own notes. If you can save it, Fabric can hold it and make it searchable.

Can I search across all my sources at once, regardless of file type?

Yes. Fabric's AI search reads inside every file type and searches by meaning. A question returns results from across your PDFs, notes, web clippings, images, and annotations together.

Can the AI summarise what I've gathered on a topic?

Yes. Ask the assistant about any theme and it synthesises from your saved material: sources, annotations, and notes. It can summarise agreement, surface contradictions, or identify gaps, all from your own research rather than the open web.

Does it work for qualitative research with interviews and transcripts?

Yes. Audio and video are transcribed and searchable, so you can find a specific moment in an interview by searching what was said. Combined with annotations on documents and images, Fabric handles mixed-method and qualitative research well.

Can I annotate PDFs and have the annotations be searchable?

Yes. Highlights and comments made on any PDF become part of the searchable whole. When you search a concept, your annotations come back alongside the source text.

How does this compare to using a reference manager like Zotero?

They serve different roles. A reference manager handles citation formatting and bibliographic metadata. Fabric is where you read, annotate, search, and synthesise across your sources. They complement each other: Zotero for bibliographies, Fabric for the actual research process.

Can I capture sources from the web while browsing?

Yes. The web clipper saves articles and pages directly to Fabric. You can also forward links or content to your email-to-note address.

Can I import existing research from other tools?

Yes. Fabric connects to Google Drive, Dropbox, Notion, Readwise, and other sources, so you can bring in existing material without starting over.

Can I use the canvas to map out my research visually?

Yes. The canvas lets you spread sources, notes, and ideas spatially. Useful for mapping a research landscape, planning a structure, or seeing relationships between sources that aren't obvious in a list view.

Can I share my research with collaborators?

Yes. Share a space or specific documents with others, or publish with password protection and analytics. You control who sees what and can track when it's been viewed.

Is my research private?

Yes. Your content is encrypted and only visible to you unless you choose to share it.

Does search work if I can't remember the exact words from a source?

Yes. Search works on meaning, not exact phrases. Describe what you're looking for in your own words and Fabric finds the relevant sources, even if they use different terminology.

Can I use Fabric alongside other research tools I already use?

Yes. Fabric isn't designed to replace every tool in your stack. It connects to tools like Google Drive, Readwise, and Notion, and works alongside reference managers, word processors, and other software. The point is having one searchable place where everything comes together.