Turn Reminders Into A Productivity Powerhouse

So here are 12 of my favorite features that make the Reminders app one of the most powerful productivity tools on your iPhone, with the last one on this list being my personal favorite. Reminders has evolved into a powerhouse that can rival almost any paid task manager, and trust me, I've tried all of the main ones. And a bit like Apple Notes, sometimes the best tool is the one you've already got. If you're new around here, my name's Ez, and on this channel, we talk tech alongside productivity. Let's get into it. So if you have an iPhone that supports Apple Intelligence, there's now a feature called Auto Categorize that uses machine learning to group your tasks into different sections that make sense without you lifting a finger. So it turns a messy inbox list into a structured plan instantly, and if anything, just helps clean up and make sense of all the stuff you've got in each of your lists. One of the biggest new features to come to Reminders in the last couple of years is having your tasks and your time in the same place. And you can now view and manage your Reminders directly inside the Calendar app. If you give a Reminder a specific time, it shows up right next to your meetings. And you can even create a Reminder by tapping the plus button in Calendar and just toggling from Events to Reminder. It just makes time blocking so much more intuitive because you aren't switching apps just to see what you need to do between calls. Although I wish you could change the duration of the task, so maybe Apple will do that in the next update. Another massive speed boost is how the app pulls tasks from other apps. So if you're looking at a recipe in Safari or you're reading along email in Mail, Apple Intelligence can extract action items and suggest them as Reminders. So if you're in Safari, for example, and you tap on the Share Sheet and then you tap Reminders, Apple Intelligence will then start suggesting different Reminders from the website you're trying to share that you can then add to your lists in the Reminders app. And it even links back to the original source so you have the context later. So speed is everything for productivity and you can now add a new Reminder control directly to your lock screen or your control center. It opens up a small overlay where you can quickly type a task, set a priority and pick a list without ever fully opening the app. You can also map the Add Reminder action to your Action button on your phone or just long press the Siri button on your Apple Watch and add Reminders that way as well. For anyone that travels or works remotely, the new time zone support is a lifesaver. So you can now set a default time zone for the entire app or choose a specific time zone for a single Reminder. So there's no more getting a 9 a.m. notification at 3 a.m. because you flew to a different country. So how many times have you missed a call and completely forgotten to follow up? In recent updates, the phone app has a direct integration with Reminders. So from your recent calls list, you can swipe left on a missed call and hit a button to set a callback Reminder for an hour later or the next morning or whenever. And it even puts a link to the contact right in the Reminder. By the way, if you're enjoying this video so far, please do consider subscribing for more tech and productivity content. I know you want to. If you're a visual person like me, you need to try the Column View. You can take any list, break it into sections and view them as columns and essentially turns Apple Reminders into a mini Trello or a Kanban board, which is perfect for tracking projects through different stages like to do, doing and done. We've all accidentally swiped and deleted something important. And now there's a recently deleted section in the app and it works just like your Photos app. Deleted items stay there for 30 days before they've gone for good. So it gives you a good safety net for your to-dos. Previously, subtasks were hidden when you were looking at your today or scheduled lists, which was incredibly annoying. Now those smart lists support a full hierarchy. So you can see the main task and all of its subtasks at a glance. So you don't lose the how when looking at the what. And if you're managing a household or a small project, you can turn the list into a shared workspace. So once you share a list via messages or mail, anyone on it can add, edit or check off tasks. And you can actually assign specific tasks to people on the list. Their contact bubble will appear next to the task so everyone knows who is responsible for what. And if you turn on notifications, you can get a ping whenever a collaborator finishes a task. So instead of just having like flat lists of reminders and tasks, you should be using the built-in priority levels to filter your focus. So you can tag any task as low, medium or high priority. You can then create a custom smart list that only shows high priority items across all of your different projects. Especially when you're feeling overwhelmed, you can just jump into this one list and see all of your non-negotiable tasks for the day. And my personal favorite and one that I wish apps like ThingsFree had is if you find yourself constantly recreating the same checklist for travel or grocery runs or reoccurring work projects, you need to start using templates. You can basically take any existing list complete with all its subtasks and tags and save it as a master blueprint. Then the next time you're packing for a trip or starting a new client project, you simply just tap use template and it generates a fresh list instantly. It completely removes that startup friction of having to remember every single step from scratch, making your reoccurring routines feel more automated. This one's been a complete lifesaver for me in terms of managing all of these video projects that I do and all the steps that I take are often either the same or very, very similar. Ultimately, you want to use any tool that will remove the friction of capturing and organizing tasks and I think Reminders is probably the best one for most people. And speaking of removing friction, my favorite app on the Mac right now by far is the AI Notes dictation app, Willow. It's a 10 out of 10 for my workflow and if you want to know more, I'll leave a link to that video at the end of this one. I'll see you there.