Photo: Konstantin Savusia (Shutterstock)
While Apple Notes has become the default note-taking app for most iPhone users, the Reminders app is often overlooked. But over the last few years, Reminders has built a strong foundation with grouping, natural language input, and smart lists. With iOS 16, Apple is building on top of those features, making Reminders easier to use, fixing some long-standing annoyances, and making its most frequently used features easier to find.
Pin lists to the top
Screenshot: Khamosh Pathak
If you use Reminders often, your biggest issue might be finding a list that you made. The new update in iOS 16 now lets you pin any list to the top section (where you previously only found default categories). Swipe right on any list and tap “Pin” to add the list to the top section. You can also go to the “Edit” section to remove lists you don’t frequently use (like “Flagged,” for example) to make more space for your own lists.
View all your completed tasks together in a smart list
There’s a new smart list in town, and it’s called “Completed.” You’ll find it in the top list, and it will show you a list of all of the completed tasks from all your lists.
Use rich text in notes
The Notes section in Reminders now gets a rich text feature, which means you’ll be able to quickly convert text into bold, underline, or strikethrough. You’ll also be able to create bullet points in the notes section.
Save and re-use templates
You’ll find lots of templates online for apps like Notion, and now you can do something similar for your Reminders lists: Once you create a list, you can turn it into a template. This feature will help you re-use your basic setup for different routines, and allows you to publish your template using a unique link. Tap the Menu button and choose “Save as Template” to get started.
Organize your schedule for morning, afternoon, and evening
The new Reminders updates break up tasks based on date and time. So when you open the “Today” list, you’ll see different sections for Morning, Afternoon, and Tonight. The Scheduled list breaks it down by days, and months for long-term scheduling.
You can include today’s items in the badge
Reminders app had a weird quirk that Apple is fixing with a Settings item. By default, Reminders doesn’t include the items that are due today in the notification badge count, because to Apple, they aren’t “overdue.” But if you use to-do apps to stay on top of daily tasks, not having a badge count might hamper your productivity. You can now fix this by going to Settings > Reminders > Include Day Today.
