Reminders Automation

Automate Apple Reminders.app via AppleScript on macOS Sequoia (15.x).

Quick Reference

List Names

List	Purpose
Next Actions	Immediate actionable tasks
Reminders	General tasks with due dates
Someday/Maybe	Future possibilities
Shopping	Purchase items
等待清单	Waiting on others

Priority Values

Value	Meaning
0	None (default)
1	High (!!!)
5	Medium (!!)
9	Low (!)

Naming Convention

Format: [Project_ID] Action_Verb - Specific_Task

Examples:

•[Landlord_Case] Call - Schedule mediation session
•[health] Book - Dentist appointment

Core Operations

Always wrap in timeout:

applescript

with timeout of 15 seconds
    tell application "Reminders"
        -- operations here
    end tell
end timeout

Create Reminder

applescript

tell application "Reminders"
    tell list "Reminders"
        make new reminder with properties {name:"[Project] Task", priority:1}
    end tell
end tell

With due date (tomorrow 2pm):

applescript

tell application "Reminders"
    set d to (current date) + 1 * days
    set hours of d to 14
    set minutes of d to 0
    set seconds of d to 0
    tell list "Reminders"
        make new reminder with properties {name:"Task", due date:d}
    end tell
end tell

Read Reminders

applescript

-- List all lists
tell application "Reminders" to name of every list

-- Count incomplete
tell application "Reminders"
    tell list "Reminders"
        count of (every reminder whose completed is false)
    end tell
end tell

-- Find by name pattern
tell application "Reminders"
    tell list "Reminders"
        first reminder whose name contains "[Project]"
    end tell
end tell

Update Reminder

applescript

tell application "Reminders"
    tell list "Reminders"
        set r to first reminder whose name contains "[Project]"
        set completed of r to true
        -- or: set priority of r to 1
        -- or: set due date of r to (current date) + 7 * days
    end tell
end tell

Delete Reminder

applescript

tell application "Reminders"
    tell list "Reminders"
        delete (first reminder whose name contains "[TEST]")
    end tell
end tell

Move Between Lists

applescript

tell application "Reminders"
    set r to first reminder of list "Shopping" whose name contains "Item"
    move r to list "Reminders"
end tell

Date Patterns

applescript

-- Tomorrow 9am
set d to (current date) + 1 * days
set hours of d to 9
set minutes of d to 0

-- Next Monday 9am
set d to current date
repeat until weekday of d is Monday
    set d to d + 1 * days
end repeat
set hours of d to 9

-- Remind 30 min before due
set remindDate to dueDate - 30 * minutes

Limitations (Not Available via AppleScript)

•Recurrence rules
•Location-based triggers
•Subtasks
•Native tags (use body field with YAML instead)
•Images/attachments

Full Reference

For complete documentation including YAML body format, error handling patterns, corner cases, and all properties, see references/Reminders_System_Reference.md.