Apple Reminders

Connect Reminders from the Plan Your Work iPhone app. Allow access when you are ready, then tap Sync reminders. The first sync imports incomplete reminders from your readable lists. Completed history does not create new tasks.

Two-way task sync

Two-way sync is on when you connect. Use the latest iPhone app on the registered source phone. The next sync also queues pending supported edits from older connections. An explicit pause stays paused.

Titles, notes, due dates, completion, and deletion sync in both directions. New tasks in an ordinary imported list also sync to Reminders. For combined lists, Edit list → New task destination sets the destination. Choose Reminders to send new tasks to its linked list. Existing tasks keep their original source. New reminders include a Plan Your Work link. This link helps interrupted syncs find the reminder without creating a duplicate.

Any synced device sends queued changes while its app is open or during a background run. Apple controls background timing. The server cannot send changes to Reminders without one of your synced devices.

List settings, task placement, priority, order, and hierarchy stay in Plan Your Work. Change dates, complete, or delete repeating reminders in Apple Reminders. Their titles and notes can sync here. Read-only lists cannot receive changes.

Resolve conflicting edits

Changes to different fields can merge. If the same field changes on both sides, that task stops sending changes.

1. Open Reminders settings in the Plan Your Work app on a synced device.
2. Tap Sync reminders to read the latest source values.
3. Review the task’s sync error.
4. Choose Use Plan Your Work or Use Apple Reminders.

The first choice retries the local fields against the latest source values. The second choice discards the pending supported edits for that task and keeps the source values. Pending edits for other integrations remain queued.

If creation was interrupted, first check Apple Reminders for the task. Use Use Plan Your Work to retry only after that check. A matching recovery link prevents a second creation.

Changes Reminders cannot accept

Some edits Apple Reminders will never accept from here. Connected settings list them under Cannot be sent to Reminders, above Needs attention. These changes have no retry. Sending one again only repeats the same refusal.

A date change, a completion, or a deletion on a repeating reminder is the common case. Apple Reminders keeps the repeat on its own schedule, so it rejects that edit. Titles and notes still sync both ways.

1. Open Reminders settings in the Plan Your Work app on a synced device.
2. Find the task under Cannot be sent to Reminders.
3. Choose Discard my edit, keep Apple Reminders and confirm. This drops the pending Plan Your Work edit and restores the Apple Reminders values.
4. Make the change you wanted in Apple Reminders. It syncs back here on the next sync.

If the row says to sync a connected device first, tap Sync reminders on a synced device to read the Apple Reminders version, then clear the change. A task that was never created in Apple Reminders has no Apple Reminders version to keep, so no discard button appears.

Sync from more than one device

More than one device can sync the same Reminders account. Sync on the new device. It joins automatically when most of the reminders it sends are already imported here. A device whose reminders do not match asks you to review a source switch first.

Which device sends your edits

Any synced device can send your Plan Your Work edits back to Reminders. The server hands one edit to one device at a time and holds that claim for five minutes. After five minutes another device can take the same edit over, so a phone that goes offline never strands it. An edit keeps its queued values while it waits, and a newer edit to the same task stays queued behind it.

The claim is exclusive on the server only. A device that already received an edit can still write it to Reminders after its claim expires, so a title change or a deletion can reach Reminders twice. Repeating either leaves the same result. A new task is different: the server records its first creation attempt, so a later attempt recovers the existing reminder instead of creating a second one.

Which device reconciles deletions

One device at a time reconciles the reminders that disappeared from your lists, and reviews changed lists or identifiers. A Mac is preferred, because it sweeps your lists about every 15 minutes while it is open. If no Mac finishes a sync for one hour, which is four of those sweeps, the next phone that finishes a sync takes over. Opening the Mac again returns this responsibility to it on its next successful sync. A sync that fails changes nothing, so the previous device keeps the responsibility.

Reminders missing from any other device’s sync are left alone, so those devices never delete imported tasks. Connected settings state this rule under the Synced devices heading, above the rows, whether or not a device currently holds the responsibility.

Remove a device and choose who reconciles deletions

Connected settings list your devices under Synced devices. Each device row offers Remove. Every device except the one that reconciles deletions also offers Reconcile deletions here, which moves the responsibility with one press. It changes no task, no list, and no source, so it asks for no review.

Remove opens a confirmation beside that device. It names the device, states that the tasks and lists already imported from it stay in Plan Your Work, and counts the saved changes only that device can send. Anything that device already saved in Apple Reminders stays there. Removing it cannot undo those writes.

Removing the device that reconciles deletions asks which remaining device takes over. Decide later is the initial answer:

• Choose a device, and it reconciles deletions immediately.
• Decide later, and settings show Connected · Deletion paused with the name of the device that left. Your devices keep importing the reminders they send, and nothing here deletes a task when its reminder is deleted in Apple Reminders. Select Use beside any remaining device to resume. No device is recommended.
• Remove your only device, and settings say that no devices sync this connection and that your imported tasks and lists stay. A change still saved here reports that it waits for a device to connect, rather than for a next sync that nothing can perform. Connect a device in the Plan Your Work app, then choose it here. A device that joins while deletion is paused imports as usual and does not take the responsibility on its own.

A paused deletion is stated on its own. Choosing a device does not resume a paused send and does not complete a list-match review; each of those is resolved where it is shown.

A saved change that only the removed device could send moves to Cannot be sent to Reminders with that device’s name. Two choices end it, and neither one needs the removed device or contacts Apple Reminders:

• Keep my version, stop sending keeps the Plan Your Work version exactly as it is and stops the send.
• Discard this change stops the send and puts the task back to the version last synced from Apple Reminders. When Apple Reminders never received the task, there is no earlier version stored here, so the discard only stops the send and the task stays as it is.

Background access per device

Each synced device holds its own background access, which expires 90 days after you allow it. One device’s access never replaces another device’s access. When a device’s access expires, sign in on that device and allow access again. The other devices keep syncing meanwhile.

Removing one device stops only that device’s background syncing. Its imported tasks stay in Plan Your Work. Allowing access again on that device requires a new grant; the old one cannot be reused. Disconnecting stops background syncing for every device and removes imported data.

Pause and switch phones

Pause writes to Reminders queues later edits without sending them. An already dispatched change can still finish. Select Resume sync to Reminders to resume delivery. The pause action is under How sync works.

Finish any dispatched write on the old phone before switching the source phone. An unfinished write releases five minutes after it was sent. Then use the matching review on the new phone. Matching preserves existing tasks and lists.

Disconnecting removes imported data from Plan Your Work. It does not delete the corresponding Apple Reminders lists.

Source identifiers replace device identifiers

Apple Reminders gives each reminder a source identifier that every one of your devices agrees on. A connection that still matches reminders by the identifiers of the phone that first synced them converts to source identifiers on its next sync from that phone.

Conversion runs only when the sync is complete and safe:

• Every reminder in the sync reports a source identifier, even when that identifier is still empty. A sync from an older iPhone app that omits the field entirely waits for an app update.
• Every reminder already imported here has a known identity, from this sync or from an earlier one.
• Every reminder you excluded during a source switch, and every queued edit or deletion, has a known identity.
• No converted identifier would collide with an import that keeps its own identifier.

Conversion finishes completely or not at all. When any check fails, the connection records the reason, keeps its existing identifiers, and keeps syncing as before. A later sync retries the check, so adding the missing information is enough.

What connected settings show

Connected Reminders settings list every device that syncs this connection, with the name each device reports. A device that reports no name is shown by its platform, and a device that reports neither is shown as This device. Each row says when that device last completed a sync, or that it has not synced yet. The device that reconciles deletions is marked reconciles deletions. These rows replace the single connection-wide “last synced” time, which described only one device.

Below the devices, settings say what is happening to the edits saved here:

• No changes waiting to be sent. appears whenever nothing is queued, including after a change is resolved by keeping the Plan Your Work version or by discarding the outgoing request.
• Queued edits that any synced device can send are counted and wait for the next sync from one of your devices.
• An edit that only one device can address is counted against that device, so a mixed queue is never credited to one phone.
• An edit that needs your decision is counted separately and listed under Needs attention.
• While a device holds a delivery, settings name that device as sending a change and still count the rest of the queue on its own.
• Each of these lines carries the icon for its own state, so a sent, waiting, sending, or review-required queue is told apart at a glance.

When a device starts sending its Reminders data and does not finish, settings show Sending to Reminders is on hold with how long the hold still has to run. The hold clears by itself. Settings then count the saved edits that the next eligible sync can send after the hold expires, without editing them again. Edits that wait for a list-match review, that only one device can address, or that need your decision are counted separately, because the hold ending does not release them.

Lists that sync through one device

Reminders stored on the device itself, reminders from an Exchange account, and reminders from a source type this app does not recognise keep identifiers that only the device holding them can read. Those lists sync through the device that supplies them. Their reminders import, update, and delete as usual, and edits you make here are sent by that device. Another device that happens to use the same identifiers gets its own lists and its own imports, so the two are never merged. Nothing is deleted and nothing is paused by this. Your iCloud lists in the same library keep syncing from every device.

Connected Reminders settings lists these lists by name under Lists on single-source sync, with the reason for each one.

Reminders still waiting to match

A reminder whose source identifier has not been filled in yet syncs here through the device that supplied it. It imports, updates, and deletes normally, and it keeps its task and its queued edits when its source identifier arrives. One reminder in this state never holds back the others in your library.

Connected Reminders settings count these reminders under Reminder matching. Matching is retried on each later sync, so the count falls as identifiers arrive.

That section also says which identifiers this connection matches by:

• Reminder matching · Shared identifiers means every one of your devices means the same reminder.
• Reminder matching · Device identifiers means reminders are still matched by the identifiers of the device that supplied them. Imports, edits, and deletions work as usual meanwhile.

When a conversion recorded why it stopped, that reason is explained there: an app that does not send shared identifiers yet, imports or excluded reminders without a known identifier, a saved change waiting on one, or identifiers that clash with existing imports. A connection that recorded no reason is not given one. Matching is checked on every sync and moves to shared identifiers on its own once enough information arrives.

Two copies of one reminder

Two lists can hold copies of one reminder that share a single source identifier. Each copy is told apart by the list holding it, so both import and both stay editable. Two reminders in the same list sharing one identifier cannot be told apart. That sync is refused whole, nothing changes here, and settings keeps showing the previous state. Fix the duplicate in Apple Reminders, then sync again.

Imports kept from an earlier phone

When you switch phones and reuse a list, an import you leave unmatched is kept on purpose. Conversion preserves that decision. A kept import never receives edits or deletions, even after conversion and even after you delete its task in Plan Your Work. Deleting that task here removes it here only. The reminder on your phone is untouched. An ordinary matched task still deletes in Reminders. An edit or deletion you queued before the switch is held back the same way, so it never reaches a reminder on the new phone. Match the import explicitly in a source switch review to resume two-way sync for it. The edit you queued earlier is sent then, without editing the task again.

Exclusions, queued edits, recovery history, task and list identity, and links to other services all survive conversion unchanged.

Reviews after identifiers change

A staged source switch review shows the identifiers that existed when you opened it. Successful conversion marks any other pending review as failed and explains that identifiers changed and a fresh review is required. Start the review again from the iPhone app. A deferred or failed conversion leaves pending reviews untouched.

Internal device removal contract

Removing a device removes its roster membership and revokes its credential through Integration::ReminderCredential.revoke(installation, device_id). Run both steps inside one installation.user.with_lock block so a concurrent grant cannot revive the removed secret. The operation leaves the other devices’ credentials and all imported data unchanged.