Reminders Templates - "iOS 16 - The MacStories Review"

Updated 10092022-145715


I want to close out this section by covering the most surprising addition to the Reminders app this year: templates. In Reminders for iOS 16, you can turn any list into a template that you can reuse yourself or share as an iCloud link with others. To do this, select the new ‘Save as Template’ button in a list’s menu; you can give your template a name and, optionally, choose to include completed tasks in it or not. Once you’ve got a template saved, you’ll be able to use it as a starting point when creating a new list in Reminders.

Saving a list as a template.
Saving a list as a template.

The addition of templates opens up a lot of fascinating use cases for the Reminders app. At a basic level, you can save your classic packing checklist or YouTube video project as templates so, the next time you’re packing for a trip or are about to publish a video, you can quickly set up a list with the same series of tasks you need to complete. This kind of personal usage is in itself useful, and it’s surprising because it’s typically an advanced feature you find in more pro-oriented task managers. At any point, you can even edit your template and add new reminders to it without modifying the original list it was based on.

Editing a template without modifying the original list it was based on.
Editing a template without modifying the original list it was based on.
When creating a new list, you now have the option to start from a template.
When creating a new list, you now have the option to start from a template.

What’s going to be interesting, however, is the shared aspect of templates. When you share a template as a link with someone else, the recipient will be able to add it to their Reminders app and see all tasks exactly as you formatted them. I think you see where this is going. Reminders supports dates, tags, images, rich links, subtasks, priorities, and flags; in iOS 16, shared templates support all these pieces of metadata with the exception of image attachments, which will be removed when sharing a template with someone else.16 This means that you can now use a Reminders template to, say, share media recommendations for TV shows or movies; you can set up a template that’s a guide to a city with links for places to visit and restaurants to check out; you can create a template for a book club with direct links to the Apple Books store, and so forth.

An example of a template for locations to check out in Rome.
An example of a template for locations to check out in Rome.

I don’t foresee relying on templates for my own use of the Reminders app, but I’m intrigued by their potential in a shared environment. The Reminders team keeps on knocking it out of the park with their app updates every year; I’m keen to see how they’ll build upon all these features introduced in iOS 16.