Google Now’s Reminders feature is powerful. You can set reminders for specific times, events like TV shows, and even have reminders go off when you visit specific locations. Time-based reminders can be recurring, popping up on a schedule.
These features are all available in Google Now for Android as well as the Google search app on iPhone and iPad. Reminders sync between your devices and should hopefully be available on the desktop when Chrome gains Google Now integration.
Set Your Own Reminders
Google Now allows you to quickly set reminders. You can tell Google Now to remind you about something later in the day or even months from now. These reminders occupy a space somewhere between alarms and calendar events. When it’s time for the reminder, you’ll get a notification pop-up.
To set a reminder, just open Google Now, say “Okay Google” and say something like “remind me to feed the dog tonight.” You can customize the reminder when it pops up. If you don’t want to speak, you can also type in “remind me” and tap Enter to bring up the reminder entry field. You can also set recurring reminders, like “remind me to take out the garbage every Wednesday night.”
You can also do this from your browser. On the Google website, perform a search for “remind me” and the form will pop up. You can also set a more specific reminder by typing the same sort of “remind me to [do something] at [time]” phrase into the Google website.
Subscribe to Event Reminders
Google Now can also remind you before certain events occur. For example, let’s say you really like watching Game of Thrones and don’t want to miss an upcoming episode. Just perform a search for Game of Thrones on Google and click the Remind me button. Google will inform you when a new episode airs so you won’t have to keep track of it on your own.
This also works with other events, like holidays. For example, Google Now can inform you before a holiday occurs, if you like. It can also keep you update with news about your favorite musical artists in the same way — search for them and click the Keep me updated button. In the future, Google Now will hopefully offer many other types of event reminders.
Note that TV show, holiday, and artist reminders currently seem limited to Google.com. If you live outside the US, you can probably access them by visiting Google.com — visit your country-specific Google homepage and click Google.com at the bottom to access Google.com and search there.
Create Reminders For Places
Google also allows you to create reminders for places using geofencing. Google Now already tracks your location, so it can display useful location-specific information, like the optimal route you should take to drive home and or the schedule for a bus stop you’re standing near.
Using this feature, you can set reminders for specific places. When you arrive at the place, Google Now will ping you with a reminder. For example, you can set a reminder to buy milk when you arrive at the grocery store you typically shop at. If you want to do something — or just remember something — the next time you arrive at a specific place, all you have to do is set a reminder for it. This is easy — when creating a reminder the normal way, just select “Where” and enter a place instead of selecting “When” and entering a time.
This also works with a search — just search “remind me to [do something] at [location]”. The reminder will appear when you get to the location. Google Now is smart enough to guess a nearby location, so if you say “remind me to buy milk at [grocery store chain]”, Google Now will use the closest location for that specific grocery store.
Manage Reminders
To manage your reminders on Android, open Google Now and tap the hand-with-ribbon icon at the bottom-left corner. On Apple iOS, tap the menu button that looks like a … and tap Reminders instead. You’ll see all your upcoming and ongoing reminders and you can choose to remove them, if you like.
If you’re using the Google Experience Launcher for Android, you can also just say “Okay Google” at your home screen to set a reminder using voice commands or get to Google Now with a quick swipe to the left.