Feature Request - Support Tags and Smart Lists

[ryanpehrson]

Problem:
Reminders have additional data useful in management and collaboration with AI such as OpenClaw - including tags. Tags can drive smart lists, which are not currently supported in the tool, and other data may be useful for the AI to work with.

Feature:
Support Smart Lists and/or Tags on Reminders and allow tool to search, add/edit/delete tags for processing.

Use Case:

1. Delegate a task to “Carson” (OpenClaw) by tagging #Carson in the tag field of a Reminder.
2. The reminder shows up in the “Delegated to Carson” list without leaving the primary list
3. The AI can pick up the tasks here in a morning briefing, propose plans, and then update with findings

Options I see:

1. Directly support smart lists if possible (this would mean the app does the aggregation for you essentially) and the ability to read, add , edit, delete tags from items, along with notes field.
2. Just support the ability to at least read tags in any item (Minimal, but more expensive to query and user has to take manual action to untag)

[memee]

Hey, I looked into this and unfortunately hit a wall - Apple doesn't expose tags through any public API 😕

Checked both EventKit and AppleScript:

• EKReminder has no tags property at all
• AppleScript dictionary for Reminders.app also doesn't have it (ran sdef /System/Applications/Reminders.app and grep'd for "tag" - nothing)

Tags were added in iOS 15 / macOS Monterey but Apple just... never made them accessible to developers. It's a known limitation that affects all third-party apps trying to work with Reminders tags.

So unless Apple decides to open this up in a future update, this feature isn't implementable.

[ryanpehrson]

Thanks.

It’s a little weird, but it would appear this shows up in the Notes field, prepended to the text with a pipe | character setting it off.

For example with the reminder-cli tool here a #Carson Tag will show up in a json like "#Carson | Reminder Notes text”. If there are multiple, they will appear like “#Tag1 #Tag2 | Text"

I have no relationship to the developer of reminder-cli, I just used it to confirm.

Tags show up in Notes for remindctl too… just missing a search or matching function from a json output that would find and capture by Tag.

[memee]

Quick clarification (I think there may be a misunderstanding):

I initially read this as "the CLI can create reminders with real Reminders tags", but after testing it looks like neither remindctl nor reminders-cli can set native tags via a dedicated flag.

What does work is reading existing native tags (created in the Reminders UI): in reminders-cli JSON output the tags appear as a prefix in the notes field, e.g.:

#Tag1 #Tag2 |

So the main missing piece in remindctl is not "create tags", but "parse/match/search by tags" based on that notes prefix (or expose tags as a separate field in JSON).

Hope that helps.

[arjungopisetty]

I'm also looking for Smart List support, generally for my groceries list. Should I create a separate issue to track that feature request?

[hubbleshare]

I submitted a feature request via Feedback Assistant back on July 23, 2024, and well... it’s still crickets over here. 🦗

🎶 Wouldn't it be nice if they were faster?
🎶 Then we wouldn't have to wait so long.
🎶 And after having spent the whole day dreaming...
🎶 Maybe they’ll finally fix what’s wrong.

Apple, I still love your spirit, but I’m losing my mind! Seriously, can we just resurrect Steve Jobs already? 🍎✨
Maybe if we think, and wish, and hope, and pray, it might come true! Until then, the "Waiting for Apple" saga continues. ☕️⏳

[steipete]

Closing as not planned for native Reminders tags/smart lists in the current EventKit-backed CLI.

I rechecked the current macOS SDK headers: EventKit still exposes no public tag or smart-list API for reminders. The open PR tried title hashtags, but that would be remindctl-specific text, not native Apple Reminders tags, and would misrepresent what the CLI can actually modify.

A narrower future feature could parse/filter the notes-prefix convention mentioned in this thread (#Tag | notes) as plain text metadata, but native tag/smart-list support needs Apple to expose the API or a deliberate non-EventKit backend.